AA SPAZIO ARTE

AA Spazio Arte is a new Art Gallery in Lugano, which opened at the end of 2022, a venue dedicated to Art in its most varied expressions. We are oriented towards both abstract and figurative Contemporary Art, without neglecting new artistic expressions more linked to major current themes. We therefore organize personal and collective exhibitions of emerging and already well-established artists, both Swiss and foreign, all united by the quality of their works.

Our Gallery includes an Atelier with original pictorial productions and the possibility of commissioning works or copies created by the artists who collaborate with us.

Alongside the gallery’s activity in the traditional sense, we wish to make a world, which still appears very elitist, accessible to the people who have not yet approached it. This project is very close to our hearts, and we believe that it could be of great interest. We are proposing either afternoons or evenings, during a snack or aperitif, in which exceptional speakers will talk about artists, artistic movements or other themes related to art, in a pleasant, relaxed way, accompanied by images, music and films, so that they are never boring. All this according to formats already tested in similar events organized in other venues, in which we had the pleasure of participating.

Therefore, not the classic conference aimed only at an audience of enthusiasts, but rather a pleasant moment of leisure, which becomes an opportunity for personal growth, where people can chat about special topics or participate to an in-depth study on lesser-known aspects.  There are so many topics to explore which, we are sure, will encounter the favor of many art lovers.

Ours is an ambitious project: to become a point of reference where people can meet new and well-established artists and, above all, where Art can be appreciated in a convivial way. A sort of an artistic lounge room.

Culture is important and must be accessible to everyone, regardless of personal academic preparation. There is sometimes a feeling of referential fear when it comes to these initiatives which, however, can be proposed and experienced in a very pleasant way. A small contribution to the cultural growth of our territory, alongside the already rich proposals offered also at an institutional level.

A great passion for Art and the desire to share the beautiful aspect of it pushed Angela and Alessandra to undertake this new project in Lugano.

For Angela Toscanini, a great passion for all Figurative Arts, Fashion and Design, the attendance of the Istituto Marangoni for Fashion Designers in Milan and a long artistic journey have led her to best express her creative talent through oil and mixed technique painting. In addition, she collaborated for years with various art galleries and, subsequently, attended a course as an art curator.

For Alessandra Bruni Della Spina, her love for all Art forms came at a young age and transformed her into a passionate visitor to museums, galleries, and art schools. After her humanistic studies and the years spent abroad, she joined the family business while continuing to cultivate her passion for the Arts outside of work.

Dedicating themselves to this new project was the fulfillment of a dream for both.

AA Spazio Arte will be present at YouNique Lugano 2024 with the following artists:

Fabio Calvetti

Kane McLay

Pierre Rulens

Angela Toscanini

Marco Vido

Cesare Viola

FABIO CALVETTI

Fabio Calvetti was born in 1956 in Certaldo, near Florence, where he still lives.

He graduated in a School of Arts and, then, in the Academy of Fine Arts of Florence, in painting.

At the 1987 SIAC in Florence, he was included in “Green Wave”, a selection of young Italian artists. The ’90s saw the painter’s first one-man shows, particularly outside Italy in Europe, Japan and the USA. It was then that he began his long-term relationships with the Shiraishi Gallery in Tokyo and the Schortgen Galerie in Luxembourg. His activity abroad is intense, being based on exhibitions in Italy, the U.S.A., in Germany, Spain, Belgium and, above all in Japan and France.

Numerous also participations to international art shows and fairs, and he has been awarded many prizes.

KANE McLAY

Kane McLay, born in 1995, was brought up across multiple countries. By the age of 14 he had frequented 5 different schools in England, Spain, Dubai and Scotland.

McLay graduated in 2017 from Duncan of Jordanstone College of Art and Design in Dundee, Scotland with a BA Hons in Fine Art during which time he also studied in Valencia, Spain and was awarded the John Kinross Scholarship by the Royal Scottish Academy. Soon after graduation, McLay took part in group shows across Scotland including the prestigious RSA and RGI Open Exhibitions. He was also represented by Compass Gallery at London Contemporary Art Fair.

McLay moved to Tuscany in 2018, establishing himself with his solo exhibitions “Encounter” at Tobian Gallery in Florence and “Dissociation” at River Concept Gallery in Pisa. His artwork is held in private collections in London, Rome, New York and Berlin.

Currently, McLay is preparing a solo exhibition, which will open in March at Galerie Marguerite Milin in Paris.

Kane McLay demonstrated exceptional artistic talent from a young age, which further flourished during his academic pursuits. Reserved by nature, he found a sense of belonging in drawing and painting, a reliable constant in his life.

McLay is a distinctly contemporary artist with undeniable academic ability, evident in all his works. He often articulates, “I aim to strike a balance between abstract expressionism, capturing raw emotional intensity, and objective realism, in order to create paintings that are both distinctive and recognizable.”

Primarily focusing on the human figure, often depicted in motion, McLay captures moments of change. In his latest work, the figures appear to be caught in a moment of metamorphosis. From the human arises a bird, a parrot (or vice versa), perhaps representing the birth of a new being, part human and part animal. This evokes reflections on the deity transformations found in mythology. A fascinating new development in McLay’s imagery, inspired by the beauty of the human figure intimately linked to its animalistic nature.

His paintings are constructed layer upon layer, often revealing glimpses of what lies beneath, much like the erosive impact of time on the walls and frescoes of the city where he currently resides. The concept of a weathered surface symbolizing numerous untold stories deeply inspires Kane McLay to create such textures of his own.

PIERRE RULENS

Pierre Rulens was born in Brussels in 1958.

From architect parents Pierre Rulens soon entered a world of artists, close friends of the family. Among these personalities are Paul Delvaux, George Grard, the cellist Van Hecke and many others. This environment soon imbued him with creativity and an immense admiration for these people. In his journey he has inevitably found his own way in the work of matter and forms.

He has participated in numerous collective and personal exhibitions in Belgium, France and the United States, as well as many awards and recognitions received.

ANGELA TOSCANINI

Angela Toscanini is a talented Painter, Art Curator and co-owner of the Art Gallery AA Spazio Arte in Lugano.

A great passion for the Figurative Arts and fashion, a preparation at the Istituto Marangoni of Milan and a long artistic preparation, led her to favor oil and mixed technique paintings.

During her artistic career, she has participated in various collective and personal exhibitions in Italy and abroad, and has performed many commissioned artworks.

Beside expressing herself as an artist, she collaborated for years whit several Art Galleries and in the sector of Home Staging.

MARCO VIDO

Marco Vido welcomes us and takes us to a garden, or rather, to the intimacy of his garden.

A riot of colors, of inflorescences that seem to pervade us with their own perfume.

It is the force of nature that fills everything, re-appropriating the space we have stolen from them for a long time. Nature is our mother.

After the “earthless” series, in which the Earth is described as a desolate land, where there is no more room for man, in a catharsis of the planet that is being renewed, where the protagonists are the colors of the land and the ice, he presented us “in flore horto” in which the bright colors of flowers with stylized shapes burst forth powerfully, and introduce us to “flōrĕo“, in which the flowers, fully recognizable, totally dominate the scene.

Marco is not new to the representation of flowers as symbols. I am thinking of “The roses of Damascus in war”, his works from a few years ago, but the difference is palpable: those roses were ethereal, sometimes painted on veils, as if to whisper the souls of those women who lived and died amidst the violence of one of the many absurd wars.

The flowers of “flōrĕo” are instead strong, overbearing in blossoming, almost cheeky in their flowering.

They are the image of revenge, of resilience. A symbol of awakening, of rebirth.

A yearning for hope for human beings, which has always been at the center of Marco’s work, who must be able to “flourish” without any limitation imposed by social conventions.

And it is precisely the positivity and joy that transpire from his latest artwork, a look towards a type of future which, with the contribution of each of us, will be able to fill itself with colors and scents again, just like a garden in spring.

Biography

Marco Vido was born in 1960 in Como, Italy, where he still lives and works.

His “origin” is the world of architecture. After thirty years of bids, projects, constructions, restorations, teaching, he gave up in 2001, considering the enthusiasm of a magical profession exhausted, in which performing architecture was vital. By looking around, the principle of architecture was too often denied, obfuscated, by rules and regulations, issued to protect, but that only led to the detriment of quality, of architecture, and of the territory. Too disconnected, at times, from man and from the territory. This is the “motor” of his making.

Even in art he had to make some choices. He believes that art must respond, either to oneself, or to society. He chose the latter. Not that one was righter than the other. It is a disposition, his purpose, because “you must make”, “you must tell”, and not be silent.

He has participated in many exhibitions, both personal and collective, in Italy, France and Switzerland, without forgetting the charity auctions to which he donated his works.

CESARE VIOLA

His works are born in dreams, or rather in a half-dream state, where mental projections are so vivid as to seem real, which translate into eidetic images that Cesare reproduces and molds.

His visions thus come to life, coming from a dimension superior to consciousness, free from the constraints and conditioning of the real world, but characterized by mysterious and cryptic elements.

Figures whose indistinct contours prevent their full features from being seen.

And that’s what Cesare wants: to create connections and correspondence between the objective world and our subjective sensations.

In his works we encounter difficult, skillful acrobatics: overcoming the limits imposed by nature becomes a challenge for him which translates into the need to transform the interpretation to make it difficult.

Thus, we find ourselves dealing with anthropomorphic ethereal figures; with powerful and proud animals, fixed in sculptural positions; with spheres that materialize and graft into the bodies of animals; with cuts of light, intersections, tangles…

Among his works, bulls are of particular importance: combative animals, without inhibitions, indomitable, powerful, and free. His Bulls have become an emblem, among collectors, of irrepressible strength, success and fortune thanks to the symbolic value linked to the stock exchange (Bull Market Economy).

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES

Cesare Viola was born in Catania (Sicily) on 12 August 1963 and moved with his parents to Campione D’Italia at a very young age.

Sensitive and lonely child, he shows his artistic propensity very prematurely.

The extraordinary world of art will open up to him during his adolescence. The sketches and drawings of those years will define his personal style and the search to make his own vision three-dimensional will lead him to sculpture.

Cesare Viola’s style has been defined as the fusion between contemporary art with a surrealist imprint and a metamorphic figurative style. He was initially influenced by the precision of the works of Michelangelo and Leonardo Da Vinci, then by great masters such as Salvador Dalì, Igor Mitoraj, Hans Ruedi Giger, by Russian sculptors such as Dashi, Alexsander Samvel and Igor Kitzberg, so that his sculptures are characterized by a complex design and make.

He has exhibited his works in many exhibitions both solo and collective in Switzerland, Czech Rep. Italy and has participated in several biennials of art.

His sculptures are part of prestigious private and public collections.