INTERVIEW WITH TIZIANO AUTERA AND TY BISHOP

Congrats on your solo show “Assembled Existence” at Artistellar in London! The recent work is so interesting, and I’m curious to learn more. First, can you talk about how the exhibition came about?

Well, I had a Series which I worked on for the past year wich was called Talking our Time, and by researching and making hundreds of drawings confronting myself with my artist friends and visiting different exhibitions like the biennale 2022, I had a completely change of approach to my work, that the meaning of that series I worked on changed not in the way I painted the subjects but in the way I assembled them. This all happend just by trying and at some point by don’t even knowing anymore what exactly I was trying or doing, my work radically changed into a new dimension. I knew by summer already that I’m gonna have the exhibition at artistellar, so I put my focus and time mostly in preparing new works and ideas for the show. The funny thing is that the final idea happend not so long before the opening. It was like I put my experience and what i understood into these 8 paintings and produced a concentrate of all I learned.

See more works from Assembled Existence at Artisellar Gallery

How was your approach to this new body of work different from previous works? The new work has a clear connection to your past work, but your approach to form and color suggests a push towards minimalism.

Yes, it was more kind of a bringing my whole experience together and picking out the most clear and declarative parts by looking back and understanding and also adding my new insights and reducing all together to something simple but fundamental at the same time. I dont say that my work is always easy to understand, but its accessible somehow.

Tiziano Autera with Adele Smejkal, Director of Artistellar

How do you come up with the subject matter in your paintings? Do you use specific references? How do you decide on the color palette?

They are all assembled kind of existences, or by at least showing an inside of something and giving it the look that they are assembled. I use pictures from nature and all kind of catching organic things, often I combine them by case and then work them out in many drawings and sometimes I attack directly on the canvas, but anyway the work always grows on the canvas, my drawings never show a finished plan. l work also digitally because after making a drawing it helps me to add another layer to my work. the digital parts gives the painting more and more an artifical effect and makes it look real. The colors I choose, by mixing the colors of the used existences and also the background is mostly a mixed form of the living backgrounds of the combined existences. Sometimes its also a choosen contrast color by the given color of the assembled subject.

*Installation view of Assembled Existence, Artistellar Gallery, London*

Between the solo show and several exhibitions, 2022 looks to have been quite a productive year for you. Are there any plans for 2023 that you can share?

Yeah, 2022 was a very full year and I had a lot of good possibilities and experiences to share and also to confront myself with others and learn. I learned from other artists and people around me by talking and open myself more and more. My plans for 2023 look in different directions to evolve my work. Probably I’m gonna make a residency in London. And some shows are also on the pipeline.

One of FOA’s launches this year was the Studio Image Project which featured over 400 artists from all over world. I really enjoyed learning about its role with artists practice and would love to learn about your space and any interesting stories behind how it came about.

Well my studio is also my apartment. I combined that because I found an apartment with enough space to have a studio room and a storage room to keep the finished works clean and out of my working area. And also presenting them to visitors or collectors when they come by. The fact of living with my work was very important to me and i think im not able to be separated to long from my work. I often work until late so I’m happy to jump directly in my bed.

Lastly, with your experience building and exhibiting a body of work, what advice would you share with other artists who want to do what you’re doing?

I think the most important thing is really wanting and loving everything you do for your work and beeing persistent. To keep it flowy and not interrupting and at the same time having a good regeneration and sometimes also the necessary distance from your work to go back with a clear mind. Making art means for me also taking care of my inner and outer self to stay healthy. I believe that everything has an influence on us not only the people but also the food and the way we treat ourself from the psycological and also physical part. I think that movement has also an important influence on our inner self.

Interview with Tiziano Autera