Ugo Mainetti - The Dream: Salvation After Receiving the Bread of God

In the history of art, a clear distinction can often be made between figurative and abstract stylistic currents. However, when an artist's goal is to represent an object that resonates with phenomenal reality but is simultaneously charged with hidden and symbolic meaning, this boundary can become blurred. Even some American Abstract Expressionist artists, such as Willem De Kooning, interpolated abstract gestures with figurative elements in some of their works. Others, such as Jean Dubuffet, succeeded in combining a decidedly informal aesthetic with the creation of grotesque figures. This type of inspiration also inspires the research of Ugo Mainetti, whose works consist of bizarre anthropomorphic figures inserted into an original context of abstract and informal expressionist languages.

This painting is truly exemplary of Ugo Mainetti's research, bringing together in a single work the many influences that fuel his artistic style. Mainetti's fundamental principle is, first and foremost, a balance between the instinctive nature of a gestural technique and an interpretative key rooted, albeit minimal, in figuration. This creates a distinctive composition, reminiscent of De Kooning in its execution, yet bizarre and paradoxical in its spirit, harking back to Dubuffet's Brutalism. The overall composition, so rich in media references yet difficult to interpret, can rightfully be included among the incommunicability of Informal art movements.

Born in Tartano in 1945, Ugo Mainetti is an internationally renowned painter: his works are included in important private and public collections both in Italy and abroad. Mainetti is admired by Vittorio Sgarbi, who aptly describes his unique way of synthesising art and dream: "However you evaluate Mainetti, it would be difficult not to consider him a true 'brutal,'" states the art critic. "Mainetti paints wildly, against the most basic dictates of good painting, against a tradition of artistic craft that has achieved astonishing results. He does so without any provocation, even if one might think otherwise: Mainetti paints spontaneously, and there is no room for provocation or other intellectualistic divertissements."

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