Biography
Born in Larino , a small town of 8,000 inhabitants nestled in a hill of Molise , rich in history, culture and traditions . It is graduated in 2004 at the art school B.Jacovitti in Termoli , he attended a course in interior designer , after which he began his life as a self-taught artist , discovering a world full of colors and harmonies ! He participates in several competitions , exhibited in various exhibitions in the Molise region , at the end of a solo , in the charming village of Termoli , in the summer of 2012 .
DR IN CRITICAL HISTORY OF MARIA GIOVANNA GIORGETTA
Francesco Santoro : color fragmentation
" My painting is still being tested , I spent several phases over the past years , I'm still trying to find my best expression , but the thing that fascinates me most is the chemical reaction of the colors , the penetration between them and the canvas. In each work I express my mood , I try to talk about the colors to make permanent what they felt when they were born on the canvas . "
In this thought of Francesco Santoro says the meaning of his art-making as well as the technique used in entrambii cases there is a preference for the color that can be seen already from a first visual approach to the canvas .
After graduation, the Molise artist embarked on his personal artistic path made of still lifes , portraits in pencil and enlarged flowers as by a lens , in which the use of color , though still treated in academic manner (a legacy of art school ) , it has in it the germ of the most eclectic propensities which will arrive within a very short time. The first paintings are, in fact , in 2010 in which the color fragmentation has already been tried over the years precedentiviene focus, generating a gradual abandonment of the figurative theme.
The paintings of this period are mostly abstract , fundamental prerogative for the artist to be able to combine the expression of his soul and the particular chemical reaction between colors that so fascinates him .
As in a child's game , Francesco Santoro is guided by primitive instincts that led him to mix colors on canvas and various materials ( acrylic, oil , solvent , paper , etc ... ) , now using the spatula , brush now , as in the canvas entitled Eleven and thirty-two ( mixed media on canvas , 60 x 150 cm , 2010 , private collection ) , whose title does not want to communicate a clue to the viewer the work in search of a visible way , but it is the attempt of ' artists to give a name to that state of mind that led the opera birth.
The same goes for the " Aphorisms " of 2012 , which is part of the fabric define is to limit (oil and enamel on canvas , 100 x 100 cm , 2012 , private collection ) Doveil aphorism meaning is interpreted by the artist in a proactive : a horizontal line of white color divides the pictorial surface into two equal parts , the upper and lower red zone predominantly yellow , the line is marred with a few touches of red and yellow paint brush creating an out pattern.
In 2013 returns to the figurative in collaboration with the Archives Pilone, the important historical archive photo of Larino where the oldest shots of Larinese memory are kept. In the series "Particolori" Francesco Santoro uses black and white selected from the archive, and transfer enlarging the canvas. Later it will operate with the process of fragmentation of color, making sure in some cases to the particular faces, as in Fascist Gathering (printing and mixed media on canvas, 2013) where the expressions, the indistinct crowd, sonomesse enhanced by color riscattandone subjectivity. From this emerges a strong artist's reflection on the historical theme of fascism and its indelible consequences as well as on also on the individual community. The gaze of Francis on the historical past is also an invitation to Molise and beyond, to become aware of their origins and to enhance them, keeping them alive in generation memory, passing them from generation to updating them through art.
In the current phase of the trial continues the figurative "Particolori" series, with a keen interest in life in his playful expression and beauty, one can not in fact do not smile in front of the canvas entitled happy Innocence (100 x 100, printing, enamel and acrylic on canvas, 2014) depicting the smiling faces of tender children, or not to be captivated by the sweet sensuality dela life (50 x 70, printing, enamel and acrylic on canvas, 2014) in which women from a now distant time they smile benign and complacent with eyes fixed on a distant point, beyond the canvas.
Maria Giovanna Giorgetta ( Doctor in History of Art )
