Antonio Possenti - In the Countryside

The "Still Life" genre emerged in the early 17th century. It consisted of compositions of inanimate subjects, most often flowers or fruit. While initially it was an opportunity for painters to experiment with naturalistic or photographic reproductions of reality, with contemporary art, the "Still Life" also became a way of interpreting reality. Indeed, as happened, for example, in the Cubist avant-garde or in Giorgio Morandi, the in-depth exploration of objects was aimed at a conceptual representation, taken beyond the mere sensory aspect.

Even in this painting, which focuses on the subject of a still life, Antonio Possenti's surrealism displays highly recognizable connotations. The language he uses has strong connections to the German New Objectivity artistic movement. We often find the same cynical nature of painters like George Grosz or Otto Dix in lashing out at their own society with lucid irony. However, unlike the Germans and the historical surrealists, his style does not rely on a deliberately illusory hyperrealism, but rather on a caricature-like painting that has more to do with social satire. This satire, however, is expressed in a highly original manner, translated into a world of eccentric pictorial quotationism. Indeed, Antonio Possenti, thanks also to his work as an illustrator and cartoonist, prefers to treat his imaginative world with a graphic style and colorful chromaticism. Thus, even the objects in the foreground are recontextualized by this painter's imagination, transfiguring them from reality into an eccentric dimension. This dimension, in addition to having a distinctly surreal character, also finds its lifeblood in a cubist-style decomposition of subjects and in the expressive qualities of color.

Antonio Possenti was an artist born and raised in Lucca (1933-2016). He was a painter, teacher, and illustrator. His artistic career began while teaching law in schools in the province of Lucca, while simultaneously working as a satirical illustrator for the weekly magazine "Il Mondo." In 1957, he met Marc Chagall. His work, both as a painter and illustrator, received numerous awards, with exhibitions both in Italy and abroad.

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