Ettore Pinelli (Modica, 1984) lives and works in Modica. Among his recent solo exhibitions: Un luogo sconosciuto, Circoloquadro, Milan, 2019; Mono, ArtVerona with Fusion Art Gallery/Inaudita, 2018; Un luogo sconosciuto, Ritmo, Catania, 2018; Mono, Fusion Art Gallery/Inaudita, Turin, 2018; UNO, BoCs Art (AIR), Cosenza, 2017. Among the group exhibitions: Tutti non ci sono, Traffic Gallery, Bergamo, 2019; Immateria, QUAM, Scicli, 2019; Historiae #0, Ex Macello, Ispica, 2019; Selvatico 13. Ghost Ghost. Painting between imagination and memory, Palazzo Pezzi, Cotignola, 2018; Tartare, Fusion Art Gallery/Inaudita, Turin, 2018; Talking with hands, Quartair, Den Haag, 2018; Arteam Cup, Fondazione Dino Zoli, Forlì, 2018; Sulla Pittura: Cingolani, Galliano, Pinelli, Rossi, SpazioSiena, Siena, 2018; 18th Cairo Prize, Palazzo Reale, Milan, 2017; Dialogica, Galleria regionale, Palazzo Bellomo, Syracuse, 2017; Visioni d’interno, Burning Giraffe Art Gallery, Turin, 2017; Premio Combat, Villa Mimbelli, Livorno, 2017; Imago Mundi, Mediterranean Routes, Cantieri Culturali alla Zisa, Palermo, 2017.
How did you get closer to painting?
Very naturally, through a normal course of study for a young man who feels that this is the way to go. I started to paint with dedication only in the last six years, developing a greater awareness and asking myself the questions of how and why to do it. He never abandoned my obsession, even though there was a period of disinterest towards the end of my years of study in the academy.
Which are the masters and artists you look at?
Francisco Goya, Diego Velázquez, Tintoretto, Caravaggio, David Hockney, Louise Bourgeois, and then, of course, Francis Bacon, Gerhard Richter, and then Albert Oehlen, Cecily Brown, Wilhelm Sasnal, Marlene Dumas.
I am fascinated by artists – many of them painters – who succeed in exalting the theatrical dimension of the work, both through figuration and abstraction. Large flat surfaces, human or animal figures, silhouetted or evanescent, like a totally gestural and sign painting have a strong emotional hold on me …
