Matteo Massagrande Italy, b. 1959
59.1 x 59.1 in
"...On the other hand the olive trees are very characteristic, and I’m struggling to capture that. It’s silver, sometimes more blue, sometimes greenish bronzed, whitening on ground that is yellow, pink, purplish or orangeish to dull red ochre. But very difficult, very difficult. But that suits me and attracts me to work fully in gold or silver."
806
Br. 1990: 807 | CL: 608
From: Vincent van Gogh
To: Theo van Gogh
Location: Saint-Rémy-de-Provence
Date: Saturday 28 September 1889
"...Then the hills here, full of thyme and other aromatic plants, are very beautiful, and because of the clarity of the air one can see from the heights so much further than at home."
788
Br. 1990: 787 | CL: 598
From: Vincent van Gogh
To: Anna van Gogh-Carbentus
Location: Saint-Rémy-de-Provence
Date: between Monday 8 and Friday 12 July 1889
Born in 1959 in Padua, Italy, Matteo Massagrande is a painter steeped in the history and tradition of figurative representation. He has been exhibiting his work since 1973, and has shown extensively around the world, his paintings featuring in many public and private collections. He divides his time between Padua and Hajos, Hungary. The influences of both locations are fundamental to the content and spirit of his practice. This is his source material. In their subject matter and method of execution the paintings evoke light, place and time. Most show architectural interiors with vistas through to exterior spaces, some focus on cryptically symbolic trees. He is particularly interested in revealing the light that articulates and discloses the subject. His technical accomplishment is evident in their subtle expression, where he deploys a masterful and meticulous command of colour and tonality.
The nature of his subject is intriguing and mysterious. He shows unoccupied, decayed, possibly abandoned, domestic interiors. These still and eloquent rooms are freighted with absence and melancholy. This is offset by the sophisticated handling of light and colour, which seduces the eye and lends a lighter atmosphere of interested enquiry. These rooms have intricate tiled floors, which flow from one space to the next, leading the eye to subsequent rooms and eventually to garden-like exteriors. What one begins to notice are deliberate variations in perspective, emphasised by the grids of tiling, which suggest that these paintings do not simply record a view, but are elaborate constructs. They are in fact composite images, collated to produce theatrical and compressed evocations of location and history.
Born in 1959 in Padua, Italy, Matteo Massagrande is a painter steeped in the history and tradition of figurative representation. He has been exhibiting his work since 1973, and has shown extensively around the world, his paintings featuring in many public and private collections. He divides his time between Padua and Hajos, Hungary. The influences of both locations are fundamental to the content and spirit of his practice. This is his source material. In their subject matter and method of execution the paintings evoke light, place and time. Most show architectural interiors with vistas through to exterior spaces, some focus on cryptically symbolic trees. He is particularly interested in revealing the light that articulates and discloses the subject. His technical accomplishment is evident in their subtle expression, where he deploys a masterful and meticulous command of colour and tonality.
The nature of his subject is intriguing and mysterious. He shows unoccupied, decayed, possibly abandoned, domestic interiors. These still and eloquent rooms are freighted with absence and melancholy. This is offset by the sophisticated handling of light and colour, which seduces the eye and lends a lighter atmosphere of interested enquiry. These rooms have intricate tiled floors, which flow from one space to the next, leading the eye to subsequent rooms and eventually to garden-like exteriors. What one begins to notice are deliberate variations in perspective, emphasised by the grids of tiling, which suggest that these paintings do not simply record a view, but are elaborate constructs. They are in fact composite images, collated to produce theatrical and compressed evocations of location and history.