Samorì's theme starts from a strong postmodernist base, where the legacy of Baroque and late sixteenth century art, a strongly rooted inheritance in every Italian and Western citizen, is reproposed in a crude and vandalous way, giving birth to very different purposes and reactions. The only one to stand out for the complexity of the meanings and the strong visual impact of the works he proposed was Nicola Samorì. The choice was partly disappointing: in some cases for the choice of artists who, even if still active, being quite old did not have much to say about the novelties of the Italian art scene but sometimes because of the smallness of the message and of the works selected and exposed. Expressing a constant state of flux, the paintings seem to take on a kind of immortality.In the Italian Pavilion of the last Venice Bienniale, only twelve artists were invited, each of whom had a reserved separate room all for him/herself and the set up of his/her works.
Samorì’s process situates his paintings as changeable narrative expressions, not so much fixed as we often think of them. Samorì’s cuts into the surface of the paintings are made carefully, deliberately, so as to leave behind ribbons of destroyed or altered material, further evidence of the work’s change by way of destruction. The artist then distorts the works by scratching and scraping away layers of paint, often continuing into the depths of the wood or copper substrate. Many of his artworks begin as portraits and stiff-life paintings, with compositions that suggest paintings hundreds of years old. I like the way that Samorì combines classical aesthetics with very contemporary artistic techniques.
Though macabre in appearance, Samorì’s works take an attitude of fascination and exploration, eschewing depression in favour of a meditative acceptance of the inevitable. Italian artist Nicola Samorì creates rich mixed media artworks that deal with themes of death, decay, and loss. Interno assoluto, oil and sulphur on copper (photo by Rolando Paolo Guerzoni)
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