Marco Cingolani

1961, Como, Italy

Marco Cingolani lives and works in Milan and is considered one of the most important contemporary Italian painters exploring the expressive possibilities of colour. In his works, painting takes shape through continuous layers of colour, glazes, transparencies and luminous contrasts that transform the image into something unstable and pulsating.

His artistic research moves through figuration, memory, history and visual perception, while colour always remains the central and vital element of the painting. In 2009, he was invited to represent Italy at the Venice Biennale.

This painting seems to unfold before the viewer’s eyes while it is being observed. There is no stable image to grasp immediately. Forms emerge, distort and disappear into the colour.

The large red mass on the right resembles a theatrical curtain opening onto something undefined. Around it, acidic greens, deep blues, luminous yellows and fluid lines construct a scene that continually shifts between figuration and abstraction.

Certain details suggest a body, a human presence, a hand or perhaps a sudden gesture. Yet everything remains ambiguous, like a dream just before waking, when images change shape without ever becoming fully fixed.

What is surprising is that the apparent chaos does not create confusion. Colour holds everything together. This is where the essence of Cingolani’s painting can be felt: not in the narrative, but in the continuous energy through which the work appears to transform beneath the viewer’s gaze.