Alessandro Bulgarini
Born in Brescia in 1983, lives and works in the province of Brescia, at the gates of Franciacorta.
The painting of Alessandro Bulgarini it is an introspective and symbolic art, linked to the study of the imaginal world and archetypes. Philosophy and anthropology, psychology and imagination are the cornerstones of original research, a lonely path, the outcome of which is a surreal syncretic iconography that questions the observer on the mystery of life and man, its paradigms, his anxieties, the search for the sacred.
Painting is Philosopher to the extent that it invokes philosophical potential, esoteric and cognitive of imagination and symbol. Each work is equivalent to the compositional reorganization of a precise concept, idea or reflection and is conceived as a ploy to awaken in the observer a question - generally dormant - about what he is looking at. Puzzles posed in terms of images, to stimulate the sometimes amazed and sometimes troubled reflection of the observer.
By recovering the icon-image, materialized on the canvas in the luminous form of oil paint - understood as an antidote to the simulacra produced by postmodern "liquid civilization" - his work speaks to us of the importance of the imaginative function and imaginal thought, about which some of the refined thinkers who continue to inspire him have written much: Carl Gustav Jung, Mircea Eliade, Henry Corbin, Elemire Zolla. A profound and avant-garde cultural heritage that constitutes the foundation and interpretative key of the painter's aesthetic choice.
After the meeting with the father of Fantastic Realism Ernst Fuchs, the original surrealist nature and visionary inspiration have been enriched and intertwined with the study of the techniques and masters of the Renaissance, Neoplatonism, the ancient alchemical manuscripts and medieval herbals, up to the iconographies and cosmogonies of ancient civilisations. Inexhaustible sources to draw on to distill visions full of meaning, then translated into the language of contemporary figuration.
Alessandro has always expressed himself using the techniques learned as a child in his grandfather Serafino Zanella's atelier, then reworked and perfected, over the years and personalized in the choice of colors and subjects. The designs are made with spindle stitching, pencils and pigments on different and valuable types of paper, often also “handmade”, sourced from selected artisanal paper mills. The paintings are executed with the glazing technique typical of oil painting, in the manner of the ancients, on canvases and boards prepared with a traditional primer based on chalk and glue.
Alessandro's work constitutes a complex gallery of meanings and enigmas, in which imagination takes shape through fervent surreal realism; an invitation, precise and aware, to be seduced by the wisdom hidden in the images.
