I CAN DO IT ALONE WHEN YOU'RE NOT HERE
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I CAN DO IT ALONE WHEN YOU'RE NOT HERE •
The Status of Things As They Have Been, 2022. Simone Mantellassi.
Plaster, wood, plexiglass, cardboard, wire, acrylic. 18 3/4 x 12 x 13 1/4 in.
I CAN DO IT ALONE WHEN YOU’RE NOT HERE
Artwork by Zena Gurbo & Simone Mantellassi
AUGUST 31 - SEPTEMBER 22, 2024
JOIN US FOR AN ARTIST TALK: SUNDAY SEPT. 22 3-4PM AT KIPNZ
KIPNZ is pleased to announce "I Can Do it Alone When You’re Not Here,” a two-person exhibition with artwork by Zena Gurbo and Simone Mantellassi, an artist couple based in Gilbertsville, New York.
Both come from an artistic background—Gurbo from a highly creative family in Brooklyn, and Mantellassi from Florence, the birthplace of the Italian Renaissance. Despite their marriage and life together, this is an exhibition of two artists and two practices. However, together since 2002, this is also an exhibition about the intensity and inspiration of a shared creative life.
The bright acrylic paints of Gurbo’s palette—most notably, a Day-Glo pink—find themselves on surfaces such as recycled paper bags, found canvases, and wood cut-outs. The embodied nature of both her creative childhood environment, as well as having taught art and creative expression to people with developmental disabilities for over two decades, is reflected in her work. Indeed her primary object is the human figure, projected as a sort of container through which she interrogates her own psyche, as well as the collective unconscious with force and humor. Gurbo is a process-oriented artist; each work develops according to its own, incrementally-revealed logic. This process of working is, for Gurbo, a movement toward awareness, and, ideally, healing.
Self-taught artist Simone Mantellassi’s early creative life was shaped by the art of Florence, where he practiced drawing, especially his hands and feet. “From there I moved to find a more suitable way to express what was lacking in early figurative compositions.” Today, drawing remains an essential part of Mantellassi’s practice, where objects and language from everyday life intermingle with a humorous, dreamy palette of color; surfaces expand and contract between resolution and dissolution. Mantellassi is drawn toward the “downcast, the broken, the half-inflated, for their very human feeling of ‘not there yet’,” spinning toward transformation. For the artist this tension is “joyous and sad at the same time.”
From certain drawings emerge Mantellassi’s sculptures, compact, diorama-like compositions within a plexiglas casing. The humor and breezy irony of his work is made concretely manifest in these objects, whose crumply surfaces, crude imitations and “imperfect” finishes are precisely where the work resonates with the jolly absurdity of everyday life. “As a stage set, from the audience you see something, from backstage you see the artifice of it all; how everything is propped up for the viewer. Being able to see both sides lets their meaning deepen and multiply.”
Temple of the Forgotten Parts, 2023. Zena Gurbo.
Acrylic on paper bags. 77 x 38 inches.
(Left) 3 Heads, 3 Kopte, 2021. Simone Mantellassi. Colored pencil and acrylic on paper in artist frame. 16 1/2 x 11 inches.
(Right) Right Under My Nose The Whole Time, 2023. Zena Gurbo. Ink and acrylic on brown paper. 14 x 7 inches.
Zena Gurbo is a Brooklyn/Upstate NY based artist using acrylic paint on various surfaces including recycled brown paper bags, found canvases and wood. Gurbo has taught art and creative expression for over twenty years with an emphasis on individuals with developmental disabilities. “Encouraging creative expression in others has given me access to unfettered insight and inspiration and allowed me to stay curious and full of wonder for the artistic process.”
Gurbo’s work is full of force and humor. The current series of paintings uses a palette of day glow colors - with the figures being largely hot pink and the inner workings of the figures primarily shades of blue, creating a very busy body. “I’m using the figure, these bright colors and this process to explore my subconscious, the collective unconscious, to investigate, become aware and ideally to heal.”
Gurbo went to art school for two years (at New Paltz) after a year of basics I then studied with one artist/professor who enabled me to do what I wanted with her as a guide. “Both of my parents are/were artists - my mother made crosses from found objects among other things and my father is an illustrator and artist who was always experimenting with new materials. It took me a long time to call myself an artist with any conviction but I rely on my art making to process, define and enliven this experience of life, which is art in and of itself.”
Gurbo has shown work in the Upper Catskills, Brooklyn and Belgium.
(Left) You Never Regret A Swim, 2024. Zena Gurbo. Acrylic on wood. 24 x 38 inches.
(Right) Some Pioneers Pondside Beside Myself, 2024. Zena Gurbo. Acrylic on wood. 22 x 25 inches.
Simone Mantellassi was born in Jerusalem, Ontario* and moved to the US in 2002.
James Brown once said of Simone’s art “Utterly fantastic in the realm of the unknown…”* *
Inspired to be an astronaut by a load of comics, he applied, but was sadly rejected, “too self conscious and flip-floppy” was their conclusion. After a period of depression and eventually self discovery, Simone embraced art as a way forward. Still shy as a mole, art was able to bring the realm of the unknown up-front for him. Instead of travels on the edge of space or jungles, his travels developed with the boundaries of his psyche.***
*Not real, born in Florence Italy
**Not that James Brown
***Not a real bio, for the real one see below
Simone Mantellassi is a self-taught artist, born and raised in Florence, Italy. He moved to the US in 2002. Simone has loved drawing since an early age, inspired by comics he created his own. His first comic “Il Muro” (The Wall) was about a hero who always dies without reaching his goal. Inspired by the art in Florence, he practiced drawing, “I did draw my feet quite a lot, and my hands too…From there I moved to find a more suitable way to express what was lacking in purely figurative compositions.”
When asked about his more recent work he said “I love the down cast, the broken, the half inflated, for their very human feeling of “not there yet” corralling toward destruction or full bloom, a stage of becoming something else, which to me is joyous and sad at the same time.
His sculptures first came to him as 2D drawings, to later evolve into 3D renditions. This third dimension allowed him to discover more of their meaning. As a stage set, from the audience you see something, from backstage you see the artifice of it all; how everything is propped up for the viewer. Being able to see both sides, lets their meaning deepen and multiply.
Ice Cream Social, 2023. Simone Mantellassi. Acrylic on paper. 30 x 22 inches.
In Memorium. Simone Mantellassi. Mixed media, paper mache, cardboard on platform. Dimensions variable. This arrangement: 14 x 24 x 34 inches.