Fashion, graphic, interior and textile designers (plus creative minds) who are trying to focus on new projects for next year and who feel they are being distracted by the more commercial and consumerist pressures linked with the festive season, should maybe try getting inspired by an art event. There is a compact exhibition at the moment at the London-based branch of the Mazzoleni Gallery (27 Albemarle Street, London; Irenebrination readers will remember it from previous posts) that may provide some great ideas for colour combinations, patterns and textures.
"Light in Motion" explores the work of three major Italian artists - Giacomo Balla (1871 - 1958), Piero Dorazio (1927 - 2005) and Gianfranco Zappettini (b. 1939). Though their styles are different and they represent three distinct movements - Futurism, Lyrical Abstraction and Pittura Analitica - the three artists share a passion for light, colour and perceptions.
Fascinated by the technological advancements of their times, the Futurists transformed their passion for modernity into abstract and dynamic explorations. Being passionate about new technology, speed, movement and light, Balla is still relevant nowadays as he reflects the obsessions of our modern lives. The artist has also been a constant inspiration for many fashion designers as he developed an iconic geometric style in which colourful bands intersected together.
Among the other works, at the Mazzoleni exhibition visitors will be able to admire his iridescent interfaces paintings with their stylised triangles forming mesmerising patterns in pastel shades or bright and bold colours.
Balla's work inspired younger artists such as Piero Dorazio who met him in the 1950s and who became a close friend. Dorazio was 60 years younger than Balla, but paid homage to the artists of the Futurist movement and managed to generate a renewed interest in Balla's work.
Dorazio was particularly fascinated by Balla's "Compenetrazioni Iridescenti" that prompted him to explore the dichotomy between light and perception.
Inspired by Balla, Dorazio started creating paintings formed by minimalist coloured lines or by intricate grids and intersecting sinuous waves, creating mesmerising chromatic and illusory effects. His compositions reunited under the common title "Jeu Flamand" explored instead the opticality of movement through linear traits.
When in the 1970s Gianfranco Zappettini arrived on the art scene, he joined the Pittura Analitica, a movement that tried to redefine painting for the modern era. Zappettini launched a study into materials and the materiality of painting and often used building materials and thread in his paintings to create his signature, illusionistic compositions.
A number of Zappettini's series, such as the 1960s "Strutture in BX" or the more recent polymaterial "reticular" compositions "La Trama e L'Ordito", create intriguing parallels with Balla and Dorazio.
The exhibition at Mazzoleni features 46 works on loan from private collections, never before exhibited in the UK and it has been extended till 22nd December, so there is more time to get away from the shopping frenzy and seek inspiration in remarkable compositions of colours and light, geometries and abstract shapes, intriguing patterns, timeless textures and composite materials.
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