SPLEEN, glimpses of painting

It opens on Saturday, January 25, 2025 at 5:30 pm at the exhibition spaces of Extra Factory in Livorno in Piazza della Repubblica (corner of Pina d’Oro) the exhibition dedicated to the work of Remo Brizzi, a great painter to rediscover who passed away prematurely in 2017.

Taking part in the occasion is Jacopo Suggi, Art historian and curator of the exhibition. Remo Brizzi, a shy artist not well known to the general public, dedicated his life to a profound exploration of the landscape, trying to capture the essence of places through an intimate and original painting.

The exhibition is titled Spleen like some compositions by Charles Baudelaire, which made eternal that anglicism that means “spleen”, the organ that in ancestral medicine oversaw melancholy. Spleen for the romantics became a metaphor of inadequacy to the contemporary world and existential discomfort, with the consequent refuge in poetic sensitivity and meditation on the meaning of life.

“The most aesthetic aspects of sadness”, as Brizzi wrote, “the despair that sharpens the senses” were not banished by the artist, who knew well that “realization requires a discipline and an almost monastic rigor” and “an absolute dedication”. He wasted nothing of that “life, cruel and powerful life” which is the sum of the anxieties and anxieties that bathe daily life.

The courage to feel, really feel, reverberates in Brizzi’s canvases in a contemplation of being that transforms into landscape.

From his hermitage of Porta a Lame in Bologna he founded a restless and non-linear pictorial research, made of evolutions, conquests, and returns.

On display, a selection of paintings that testify to Brizzi’s stylistic evolution, from city views, to the more rarefied and lyrical representations of natural landscapes. The exhibition thus offers the opportunity to rediscover an artist who, despite operating far from the spotlight of the art world, has been able to develop a personal and profound pictorial language, capable of dialoguing with the Italian landscape tradition and at the same time opening up to more contemporary suggestions. The invitation is to immerse yourself in the poetic universe of Remo Brizzi and let yourself be carried away by the emotions aroused by his works.

The exhibition will be open to the public free of charge until Saturday, February 8 with opening hours from 10:00 am – 12:00 pm and 5:30 pm – 7:30 pm (closed on Sunday mornings and Tuesdays).