Fintan Magee The Ponds.
Stories from the infinite periphery
29 April – 3 June 2016
Via di San Salvatore in Campo 51, Rome
Free Entrance
“Everyone has a story worth telling. Be tolerant and understanding with others.” Fintan Magee
From 29 April to 3 June Galleria Varsi – one of the youngest galleries producing street culture in the capital – will host a solo exhibition by Australian street artist Fintan Magee, “The Backwaters. Stories from the endless suburbs. Known internationally for his large-scale murals in galleries and street art festivals around the world, including Indonesia, Colombia, Russia and the United States, Magee harkens back to the childhood era, incorporating characters from a marginalized urban context. Magee began his art career as a writer on the streets of Brisbane. He has since moved on to murals, the iconic style that has made him an internationally renowned artist. His large-scale works, created on the walls of buildings on the outskirts of cities, mix surreal and figurative elements. The theme of the exhibition is the artist’s childhood memories of his native Australia, and tells the stories of the people who lived in his ‘cultural backwater’ in the 1990s. The exhibition includes works on paper, canvases and mixed media sketches by Magee, alongside a life-size plaster sculpture of a child who accidentally falls off his bicycle, a reminder of the artist’s and all viewers’ childhood. Through the eyes of a child, the artist recounts the suburbs of Brisbane, an isolated town inhabited by people of the most diverse and varied origins, Indians, Filipinos, aborigines, Italians, Maoris, Vietnamese, Greeks and Pakistanis who inhabited the streets of Brisbane. cohabiting within a short mile radius where their children have grown up together. Magee sees his art as a tool to tell humorous stories, indirectly touching on important social issues such as society’s impact on the environment, migration and social exclusion. Depicting abandoned objects and places and marginalized individuals, the artist takes the viewer on a tour of the periphery of the world where the sights of tourists never reach. “I love painting on the street, because there art is integrated with everyday life and stimulates people to develop their opinion on art”, says Magee who, before the exhibition, will create a mural in the Roman suburb of Primavalle, in collaboration with the Muracci Nostri group.
The gallery
Galleria Varsi is among the youngest realities that have been producing street culture in the capital since 2013, always with an eye to the underground scene while continuing to receive the best artists of the moment. Located in the historic center of Rome, it opens its doors to contemporary and avant-garde artists for their personal exhibitions. Many of the artists (writers, street artists, illustrators, sculptors and photographers) mostly belong to the street culture, whose innovation has consecrated the gallery as an original space in the panorama of Rome. The founder Massimo Scrrocca declares that “although the Varsi Gallery is still quite recent, it has become internationally renowned thanks to our continuous collaboration with high-level world artists such as Etam Cru, Herakut, Dulk, Etnik, Run, Alice Pasquini, Nosego, M – City, Solo, Daniele Tozzi, Mr. Thoms, Jacopo Mandich, Diamond and the two sacred legends of the American graffiti scene of the eighties, Blade and Skeme. From the outset, the gallery has focused on the importance of communicating with other countries through its own channels (website, online shop, social network, etc.) and has become, especially for American tourists, a must-see during their visit to Rome”.
The artist
Born in Lismore NSW, Fintan Magee moved to Brisbane as a child and started drawing soon after. In his early teens he was exposed to the graffiti culture of Brisbane and started painting on the walls. Moving away from traditional graffiti in recent years, large-scale murals of him often inhabit isolated, abandoned and destroyed corners of the city. His paintings mix surreal and figurative imagery and are deeply integrated into an urban environment; they explore themes of waste, consumption, loss and transition and contain sentiments and a softness influenced by children’s books. He has traveled extensively carrying out projects in Sydney, Melbourne, London, Vienna, Los Angeles, Miami, Atlanta, Bogota, Buenos Aires, Copenhagen, Moscow, New York, Oslo and Dublin. His diligence, technical skill and progressive approach to painting have cemented his reputation as one of the leading figures in the Australian Street Art and Contemporary Mural movements.
WHERE: Galleria Varsi – Via di San Salvatore in Campo 51, Rome
WHEN: April 29 – June 3
HOURS: Tuesday to Saturday from 12:00 to 20:00, Sunday from 15:00 to 20:00, closed on Mondays
CONTACTS: (email protected) | www.galleriavarsi.it | 06 68309410
Press Office Antonella Bartoli | (email protected) | 339 7560222
