Description
Roberto Lazzarini was born in Massarosa in 1951, his roots are firmly branched out in Versilia, a step away from the sea. His artistic career begins from a young age, in continuous research and experimentation, those who know him personally would say: a soul in pain that is not opposed to an artistic soul. The first works of an expressionist stamp already show a strong personality and a creative impetus which is reflected in the use of colour. The chromatic mixes are energetic, decisive, often contrasting, the mix is rich and material. For many years, Lazzarini was unable to completely detach himself from figuration, he painted men, houses, trees, rivers, animals, inserted in a very particular space, where color predominates over shapes. His paintings have no compositional order and do not follow the rules of perspective, they are images of the mind and of inner reality that materialize on the canvas in random order, spontaneously and gestural, there is no preparatory drawing, there is no scheme rational, the idea bursts forth and invades the space of the canvas. Lazzarini uses the spatula, prefers it to the brush, because the stroke is clear, the gesture expresses strength and determination and there is no turning back. Over the years, he gradually moves away from figurative representation and begins the path of abstraction, where he seems to have found his way home. Color has never been more expressive, gestures quick and sure, shapes emerge from the depth of the chromatic combinations in a continuous overlapping. The 2008 collages mark the passage towards the search for a depth or three-dimensionality that is no longer illusion and appearance, color expertly dosed on the two-dimensionality of the surface. With these works, the canvases attached and superimposed on each other come out of the picture, creating shadows and real reliefs even if slightly perceptible.
