Fabrizio Carbonera

Fabrizio Carbonera, born in Sondrio in 1949, comes from a long-established family from the Valtellina. He trained as an artist in Milan, first at the Liceo Artistico and then at the prestigious Accademia di Belle Arti di Brera, where he graduated summa cum laude in stage design, costume design and art history. His early career developed in the world of theatre and performance: he worked with the Teatro alla Scala, with Strehler's Piccolo Teatro and on various film and television productions, developing a sensibility for space, light and large dimensions that remains a distinctive feature of his painting.

In parallel, from the 1980s he began to fly, an activity that would accompany him for more than thirty-five years and that became the inspiring core of his artistic research. Today he lives and works between Cortina d'Ampezzo and Dölsach, in Austria, and focuses his output on what he describes as "the epic breath of aviation history". His works do not simply depict aeroplanes but precise models, chosen for their technical or historical significance: aircraft that marked technological turning points, embodied dramatic episodes or represented foundational moments in aviation. Each painting is accompanied by a technical and historical record of the model depicted, a testament to meticulous research and a profound respect for his subject matter.

Carbonera avoids allegory and futurist stylisation: his painting springs from the emotional force of the real, from the need to "feel the subject" like a poet who writes in a single breath. His technique, the fruit of academic training and stage design experience, allows a masterful orchestration of light, shadow and perspective, with a dynamic rendering that conveys the physicality of flight and the narrative tension of the events depicted. He works from historical photographs, period documents and, at times, frames from iconic films dedicated to aviation, transforming these materials into powerful and engaging images.

Alongside aeronautical subjects, he also produces landscapes, war scenes and, on commission, depictions of private aircraft or other vehicles such as vintage cars. His work, rare and highly sought after, finds an enthusiastic audience among aviators, collectors and scholars, who recognise in his paintings historical fidelity, technical precision and the ability to capture the authentic emotion of flight.