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| Gian Berra in 1973, like hippie |
Gian Berra in 1973.....
My roots are important. These are the childhood experiences that form. Forget or pretend to be water under the bridge that is misleading. I care so much that I do I compare with them every moment. Return to your roots is how to get the strength, enthusiasm, willingness to grow as all the puppies of the human being. Mature without carrying the wonder of childhood is like dying. Nature is indifferent to the identity of the individual creatures. It affects the mass of life that replicates itself. So I think that intelligence is an event happened by chance, at least until it really will not be used for the benefit of each identity that you want to play live the life.
Gian Berra organize the first public exhibitions of his art in the late 70's when the great leap of the art market has now been exhausted. The economic boom is now a memory and the reality of things requires a period of reflection really healthy. Listen to him:
"... It seemed that the illusion of aping the excesses of the international art market was worth more. The pictures without content were no longer taken into account. Even in the province's" artists "who had ridden the fashion of the new rich form an image they realized that it was now a hangover it was over the ridiculous ... "
"... What could I offer with my art so naive, skinny," timeless ", now taken for granted? Yet my inner fire begged me not to notice and to continue to dig behind the masks of those who live on illusions a successful end in itself. It was a tough choice, but only so I felt satisfied. In that time still did not speak of "roots" and the dark future on the horizon looked like a hopeless void.
I realized that it was so easy to let the memories showed me the path of my true identity. Why should the people who swarmed around me did not see the colors that I admired about me? I stopped to listen to the voices of the old walls, I was blessed to greet the stones of the bed of the Piave and watched kidnapped the chimneys were smoking from the rooftops. Every now and then fled riding my old Moto Guzzi 500 military and reaches the sea in Jesolo. The wind and the sun comforted me and made me dream with the enthusiasm of those who have forgotten the lesson of freedom that came from '68. The great lesson of John Lennon singing the Hippy dream seemed forgotten. The party seemed over, the policy failed to distort the dream in violence and deception. The New Age had not yet arrived in Italy and minds were lost in that void. And glad of it.
But I wanted hard. Even then I was convinced that the wealth was inside each of us. was enough to pull it off. Do not you and no one gives when you find the street or is imposed on children as absolute truth ... asks in exchange for your soul ... "
"... I had already decided: I turned the images felt my soul into concrete representations that everyone could see. Paintings, real forms, writings, poems, concepts and I would have adored me first. Instead of trying to create idols the road. "
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| gian berra, like a clown that looks really amazed ... |
I was born in a day in November 1947 just after the war was over. A Segusino (TV) there were very few paved roads and telephones. Susa is a village in the hills, almost mountains. Those brave they went to work abroad, but the flight was started 100 years earlier when the artificial paradise of the Venetian Republic was wiped out. The United brought you more misery than before I was born and when poverty was the norm. The misery that the strict laws when it is associated with ignorance. Only the sentiments of humanity and infinite patience of the women who saved the soul of the countries oppressed by a sense of helplessness in the face of events. These are problems that afflict human beings, not Mother Nature. Susa was a fortunate and wonderful nature. but its inhabitants did not know. I spoke recently with the few remaining old and I had the good fortune to discover the reality hidden behind the fear of starvation. As each isolated from the world's conflicts and hatred for things born from nothing, was enough to step on the field of a neighbor, stealing an apple to invoke hatred. The talk of the country were run by the perpetual and every favor was the result of submission to those who could put a good word. The tavern was the outburst of males and gossip a double edged sword of old ladies. The dialect of Susa was sharp and decisive as that of the mountain. The church was the place to see who came every Sunday to show himself. Who we were not aroused suspicions.
My nature will be enchanted by this timeless corner of Veneto. An optimism that led me into the human and physical landscape of those places. A Venetian who was struggling to throw out its roots. When he was sixty-eight, great time, already beginning to explore the surrounding world and the passion of painting became the main direction.
Representing the wonder for the world that was growing inside me does not pay, just like how all the passions. The mere fact of living it satisfies and makes you continue. The enthusiasm of youth to take me on a difficult road to manage. The artist works in themselves, but every moment the search box.
I soon learned that the reality is quite different. How strange the art market! Nor is the space to dream. But I set myself to do it my way, and the energy was great as the dreams.
The art gallery Martinazzo Montebelluna gave me a valuable hand in 1978 out of the shell. Then began the real number of exhibitions, largely self-managed.
My art was always optimistic and enthusiastic. I was interested in the outlet end in itself. A naive figurative and essential that time is filled with flashes of irony and smugness. NEO BAROQUE as a figurative call it love.
Just a dream, like the rare sculptures already begun to produce then. A pleasant discovery was the watercolor I have always had a hand quickly and spontaneously. I still enjoy, especially in small sizes.
But the game never ends: how to have fun without using the picture? Thus leaving no stone unturned defied the boundaries further and further began my artistic form of gambling.
The BAROQUE INFORMAL was already in my hands trying another form of expression. Sounds easy, but turned out to be a street full of new challenges. The concept that loses its immediate readability in favor of a proposal without thinking of suggestions: a call for the viewer to challenge his own feelings and see where it could go.
I thank my last (of time) friend and admirer Giancarlo Nadai that continues to give me suggestions and opinions. An artist who need it like bread.
Gian Berra, Spring 2007
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| Osteria da Rafael, Covolo di pederobba, a piece of soul thrown away by the ignorance of the people of Veneto |
Overview of 35 years of events:
From 1977 to 1980:
I organized two exhibitions in Treviso Ca 'de rich and 4 years on permanent display at the gallery in Piazza del Val wheat. Due to the personal gallery Brotto Cornuda (TV). Two personal exhibitions at the gallery The Well of Castelfranco Veneto, Staff in Villach (Austria), Collective in San Diego (California, USA), staff at the gallery of Our Lady Bridge in Conegliano TV, the gallery staff Rasarda in Montecatini Terme, the beginning of collaboration with the Gallery Martinazzo Montebelluna. In 1978, expose for the first time in Treviso at the gallery "The Casket of Val." It 'an opportunity to know the "market" for my province. I was offered the opportunity to exhibit at the historic hall of Ca 'de Ricci for two years in 1978 and 1979. I was presented a painter of great value in vogue in the city: BRUNO FAEL. I met him in his splendid study at Victoria Square and I was generous with advice from which to draw and the result of which I heartily thank him.
In 1980 I decided to open my new studio in Trento in Piazza Santa Maria Maggiore. The year-long adventure in which guests in my study, a painter friend of exception: BRUNO DONADEL of Pieve di Soligo (TV). Staff Pejo (TN).
From 1981 to 1991:
Back in the studio of Covolo di Piave (TV) and organize the series of events that follow: Employees in Turin (International Art Centre), Personnel in Padua (gallery Semeghini), shown at "GIPSOTECA Canova" in Possagno along with Danilo Soligo (1984), continuously for two seasons at the gallery Bafile in Jesolo VE, for two seasons in the gallery Sartori stay in Lignano Sabbiadoro, in 1986 the series of exhibitions in New York: a personal Lanuvio and another in Genzano on Roman hills. An Art in Rome at Saletta. From 1987 to 1991 the series of summer exhibitions in response to the "Celebration of Unity". All those summers around the Veneto, about 35 exhibitions in direct contact with people. In 1989, the adventure begins in Germany. Personal Dusseldorf, Braunschweig, Monaco and Wurzburg. Gian B-wandering points of the artists who have already encountered this: Luciano Buso, Danilo Soligo, Roberto Polanco, Ottorino Stefani mentioned in the bio page of this site.
From 1992 to 2005:
In 1989 he met Franco Carraro, the founder of Radio 5 range, and a free radio alternative that works in the Veneto and also played outside the region. It 'an opportunity to work with the radio to spread the message creation. Gian Berra keeps you a broadcast on Sunday afternoon for some time: the title is "Between East and West", themes of confrontation between two cultures meet.
In 1993 he began the adventure of PRACTICAL COURSE OF PAINTING I create as a way to interact with people who live near me. The aim is to gain experience of practical creativity to anyone who wants to try. Nearly a thousand people attended the course. Slow down with the personal but I do travel with European collectors in Paris, Prague, Metz (France), Liege (Belgium). I create the Cultural Association "cryolite" to help emerging artists shy of my land. Fund a "New Age Poetry Competition", indicating a great feast of poetry every summer solstice. Poets who reward each other without expert critics. Arrange for eleven years at the City Hall Cornuda (TV) "a collective of Easter" in order to meet local and foreign artists. In 2005 I dedicate this exhibition will be the last to the artists closer to professionalism, but too shy to organize. Almost all of Valdobbiadene (TV). Outstanding artists with more experience and more years of practice: Sergio Bortolini, MIRELLA SOTGIU BEPI Mionetto and JOHN CARAMEL chart wonderful, shy and reserved in his country of Valdobbiadene was virtually ignored. I visited him and found him already very ill. It was an honor for me to propose an exhibition.
From 1995 to 1999 he attended a complete course of training in Psychosynthesis and the result is a diploma at the Center for Psychosynthesis Padova, even then already directed masterfully by Dr. Cynthia Ghidini. It 'an opportunity to investigate the mental mechanisms that form and express the hidden power of creativity. The increased awareness of the potential hidden in every human being are within everyone's reach: just past fears induced by an education which limits the courage so natural in children, more daring than what is obvious.
In the meantime, I write poems and stories begin with the first (see the darkened pages). For several years I have fun with painting INFORMAL BAROQUE which joins in perfect harmony with the figurative vein distinguishes me. There are only two languages that only require you to be there and have their say. Return home in 2003, now live and work away 38 boats always Covolo di Piave TV. In the meantime I found the time to do several conferences on the theme of "Fear, who is she?" The last one I held in November 2006 with a staff of my works very well managed at the Art Workshop in Conegliano TV. The friend Giancarlo Nadai I also organizes a permanent at the "King's Bay Inn" on Refrontolo (TV), that too is a way of placing art in direct contact with people. I move less and now that the paintings to travel. In December 2006, finish my first novel: WASERE, dragon heart, about 200 pages, which I circulate among the closest friends waiting for a publication. The novel is set in 1906 in the village of Segusino (where I was born) and tells of a mysterious event actually happened in those mountains, magic and reality collide when the soul of the place awakens. But I'm already writing another of a completely different genre.
Gian Berra books are available on Lulu.com. http://stores.lulu.com/baroque
Gian Berra
