Gianni Gianasso was born in 1948 in Sciolze (Turin), where he lives and works
From a text by Edoardo Di Mauro for his solo show at the Ikebò Gallery in Turin in 2010:
“A poetics strongly characterized by the use of the pictorial instrument even if integrated by other elements that fit harmoniously into the body of the work like that of Gianni Gianasso finds its place in the current season, within which it is able to offer a absolutely original contribution. The pictorial one is a suitable tool for those who use it as a viaticum for a live narration of the stereotypes that crowd our metropolitan daily life, throwing new light on glimpses and shots of hidden and neglected corners of post modernity, or to others which, on the contrary, tend to demystify with irony the sparkling and ephemeral media icons by which we are surrounded or still, as in the case of Gianasso, offer a stimulating short circuit between primeval archetype and extreme actuality, always avoiding an easy flattening on the real by virtue of privilege granted to imagination and supernaturalism, a concept wisely stigmatized by Baudelaire in pages that are still relevant today. To frame Gianni Gianasso’s work, one cannot ignore his professional training in advertising, which began by a strange combination in a highly emblematic year like 1968, where the last remnants of industrialism undergo a definitive setback that generates entry into society. technological. Advertising has more or less consciously subtracted ideas from art, offering in exchange for this an excellent pretext for expanding its sphere of influence outside the traditional enclosure in an attempt to create an aesthetic society that is actually now manifesting itself in full, albeit among many contradictions. Gianasso has wisely played on the bank between the two areas with excellent results that have imposed him as an established advertiser in a notoriously competitive scene like that of Turin. But Gianasso has always been a skilled and active artist and now he is unfolding all his considerable potential in this field with an already long and settled path behind him. Gianasso’s style, endowed with an evident personal figure, can however be electively related to that interesting and not yet fully evaluated Piedmontese surrealist line known under the name of Surfanta. This current, in the wake of the metaphysical experiences of the first half of the twentieth century such as those of Felice Casorati and Italo Cremona, matures in Turin in the tragic years of the Nazi occupation, where the climate of violence is exorcised by appealing to the underground world of mystery with various people who gather at the Macabre Attic created by Lorenzo Alessandri. In the years following the end of the conflict, these artists venture through the meanders of the city, narrating facts and characters, privileging the marginality and creating a mix of surrealism and fantasy (hence Surfanta) contrasted with realism and abstractionism experienced as styles sometimes of manner. In addition to the aforementioned Alessandri, in this current there are, among others, Molinari, Abacuc, Colombotto Rosso, Macciotta and Pontecorvo. Gianasso’s works from 1993 to today are developed in cycles characterized by some variations inserted within a unitary vein where the painting, always of high quality without ever leading to virtuosity as an end in itself, is sometimes combined with material inserts and three-dimensional. In the series “States of waiting” we have the prevalence of metaphysical portraits in the wake of De Chirico where a sort of short circuit is made between past and present and where a climate of suspension and mystery prevails that highlights even slight
ancestry from Magritte’s poetics. The subsequent “States of light” sees the presence of landscapes imbued with magic, woods in which trees with elongated trunks stretch out towards the light in a breath of life that recalls the supreme harmony between heaven and earth preached by a philosopher fundamental for history of aesthetics like Plotinus. With “states of replication” we have the reappearance of the human figure. Represented with demystifying irony in a depersonalized condition that denounces the substantial alienation between the self and the world. In “Anatomie mediali” the figure begins to give way to the aniconic construction of the image, often inspired by oriental themes. On the canvases there is a sort of cosmic dissemination of signs and symbols whose dense network tends to tear apart to cast a glance on reality. A line that tends to continue in the “Sound images” where we have a first appearance of three-dimensional installations linked to the poetics of the object. In “States of Awareness” Gianasso proposes works of pure surrealism characterized by a vorticist style that underlies the evocation of a space-time curvature that can be understood in a state of calm and mental ascent. In the latest series of works, the subject together with a selection of the previous ones of this solo show at the Ikebò exhibition rooms in Turin, Gianasso, always in line with his path, he seems to want to work, in a positive moment of his artistic career, an effective synthesis of all the formal ideas illustrated above. We therefore have the proposal of works all characterized by a black backdrop where faces and zoomorphic icons flash with a spiral rhythm, anatomical portions and virtual depths evoking distant worlds, archetypal symbols and allegories of everyday life in a visual dimension that always arises with perfect equality between the figure and abstraction with an inspiration that, even when it expands on the site of the installation, blends the motif of ancestry with the immanence of the present, taking care not to make its language exclusive and mysterious with the evident appeal, in different compositions , to an invigorating dose of irony ”
For a few years he collaborated as an illustrator and creative designer for numerous promotional campaigns in Italy and abroad, and then devoted himself more and more to more strictly artistic production, a creativity free from the logic of advertising and increasingly deeply meditated.
Since 1968, his exhibition and artistic activity has been incessant and has seen him participate in numerous exhibition events, always growing.
On these occasions, in addition to finding the favor of the public and creating a selected network of admirers, Gianni Gianasso collected positive comments from critics and distinguished specialized journalists.
All this led him, together with uncommon technical and creative skills, to a high-level professional achievement, recognized both by private gallery owners and by public bodies.
Nel 2003 la sua opera “Abbracci” viene selezionata per comparire all’interno di “ManifesTO”.
In addition to important participations in public and private events, on the public art front, the Red Bench against violence against women, inaugurated in autumn 2016 at the Municipality of Sciolze
Three works by Gianni Gianasso are part of the collection of the Urban Art Museum. The “Wanda”, of 2009, made up of five sheets painted on the external wall of the Osteria il Torchio, in via Rocciamelone 7, “Edosauro” (2011), four sheets painted on as many blind windows of a building located in via Rocciamelone 1, “Fire” of 2017, consisting of three painted sheets on the external wall of the Pizzaria Peperosso restaurant in Via Netro 22.
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