5 questions to Giulio Zanet
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Smartarea. Your works must be seen as an interpretation of reality, or rather as the expression of something deep inside you? Giulio Zanet. Both things. Reality and its interpretation pass through my vision; what is inside me depends on how reality impacts upon me. I have always paid much attention to how what is around me has an influence on me. Human beings have a great adaptability, for the better or for the worst: I think that out of habit we could stoop so low as to do the worst things. And I am part of the world, so I guess my works are at the same time expression of myself as well as of the external world. It could not be anything different.
Smartarea. Your painting is often raw and very direct. Giulio Zanet. I am not interested in provoking. I am more inclined to suggest or invite people to a reflection. Interpretation is extremely free, I do not have any message to spread. Smartarea. Tell us something about your painting technique and about how you assign titles to your works. Giulio Zanet. I work very freely. I try not to set myself too many limits. I sketch something on the canvas, then I add, remove, cancel. I have some ideas in mind and try to give them a shape. When I start a new work I do not have any idea how it will end up with. No projects. I only know what I would like to focus on. It slowly takes shape. My work is a process, and its sense lays exactly into it. The title hangs over until I find a sentence capable to sum up what guided me in the creation of the work.
Smartarea. What artists influenced your art? How are you innovating? Giulio Zanet. I let myself be influenced by everything. Just to mention some key modern artists: certainly Schiele and Bacon, and then Rauschenberg and the Neue Sachlichkeit. Amongst contemporary artists: Neo Rauch and Nathalie Djurberg. I could go on with this list for a long time, moving from cartoons to illustration, from cinema to literature. I do not make any attempt to be an innovator, I think it is quite complicated to invent something new these days, especially in painting. I try to do my job and to do it at my best. Perhaps this trite coherence has something original in itself.
Smartarea. At the 2010 Italian Factory Prize you have been awarded a two month residence program at the GlogauAir centre in Berlin. What are you expecting from this experience? Giulio Zanet. I intend to work on the sense of not belonging. I do not have any idea about what will come out of it. It is my first residence program and I will gladly accept whatever it will bring about.
8 February 2011 |
Giulio Zanet in his studio
 Giulio works very freely. When he starts a new work he does not have any idea how it will end up with, he only knows what he would like to focus on
 And slowly the artwork takes shape...What's next? |
