The abstract works of Gualtiero Passani are characterized by the expressive and symbolic use of color. As early as the 1950s we can see a movement away from realism towards something more fundamental. In his initial experiments, the compositions appear as though they are colored oil on the surface of a table. In these first years of abstract experimentation, the differences in color are barely perceptible and even the fragments which make up the various works are selected and placed with the specific intent of giving chromatic softness to the whole. Over time the diversification increased, with the introduction of more intense color contrasts, bold cuts and shapes, drawn together in an imaginative and innovative whole that gives originality to each work.
The abstract forms present in Passani’s works capture a close connection between a work of art and a spiritual dimension. Color has two effects on the observer: a “physical effect” based on momentary sensations, determined by the visual registration of one color with respect to another, and a “psychic effect” caused by a spiritual vibration, through which the color reaches the soul.
Gualtiero Passani adopts a maxim by Wassily Kandinskij (1866-1944): “Art does not reproduce what is visible, but makes visible what is not always visible”.
COLLAGE
Collage has been a constant practice in Gualtiero Passani’s artistic career. In the early days he limited himself to inserting fragments of photos into his oil paintings, in order to characterize particular subjects. Then over the years, he used this technique to exercise a very personal artistic expression. The fragmentation, then recomposed with extreme skill, became a way of making art in which he was able to create fascinating compositions, more or less abstract, but where the chromatic balance has always been respected. The collage has been transformed in an incisive way to continue its expressionist path. It is in fact “Abstract Expressionism”, each colored tile has its own emotional justification, a reasoned aesthetic and descriptive motivation. The multitude of pieces that make up the works in the last decades of activity is astonishing and what is even more striking is the artist’s ability to infuse this variegated chromatic set with a sense of completeness and harmony.
