Regardless of your belief, whether esoteric and spiritual, pragmatic, or ideas based on empiricism, the cognitive value of Gustavo Francesconi’s artwork enhances your knowledge and sensational experiences as if you have visited new worlds.
Gustavo Francesconi is a Brazilian Graphic Artist Plastic Designer. He combines practices that cross over, by exploring colors, shapes, chromatic to poetics, and instrumentals guided by practical-theoretical bases of science and interpretation of symbols.
He creates a dialogue together with sound codes and frequencies, natural elements, and geometrics studies to convey the notion that: “Control the chaos, who wins is a harmony.” His choice of materials from various interests is a representation of conflicts that resolve and work together to heal.
According to Clélia Dehon, responsible for the cultural mediation of the Louis Vuitton Foundation, Gustavo’s art “is a hypnotic universe, with pop features, almost psychedelic exotic who discovers his work.”
Interview:
Jupilings: Your story
GF: I was born in a small town in southern Brazil called Joinville. My curiosity and fascination with the human understanding of reality led me to where I am now; I am 34 years old, and I dedicate my days to the creative universe. I am the founder and director of APOC, an independent graphic design studio created in 2013 as a necessity to evolve my work as a creative. At the same time, this platform allowed me to enter the artistic universe profoundly. I felt in control of my ideas and goals. I have been working as a designer for 15 years. I dedicate myself to artistic research for 7 years and feel the evolution of my thoughts every day. The transformation has taken me to an enlightened and mysterious place, in the future I will be what I lived in the past, and in the past, I will be what I felt in the present. My story doesn’t exist.
Jupilings: Are you working on a new series-
GF: I become fully self-aware when I reflect on my production. I’m in a new phase. I recently chose to be an independent artist without gallery representation, which allowed me to have control over my entire collection. For the first time, I perceive my production as a whole, observe each technique, and where the creative synapses came from. Maybe I turned a key that I shouldn’t have, but I felt creatively predictable and it bothered me. Presently, my work is mimetic, a constant unfolding of repeated series without cadence, but that are latent to my creative space.
At this time, I am working on a series of collages based on discarded prints and test runs. Material that I kept for years, and I am revisiting to reframe forgotten material, transmuting these compositions into new experiences. I am developing a painting series called Ruptura; basically, landscapes, experimenting with new textures and paints. The motif of the painting focuses on color. The research is about the paint, about density, and dilution of the chosen media. For example, at this moment, I am creating my colors with a mixture of plaster, acrylic mass, acrylic paint, screen printing paint, pigment powder, and liquid. The quantity of these variants determines color plasticity and tone depth.
I am in constant production, either creating graphic pieces or thinking about art. The artist’s job is to perceive the world around and channel this energy to transcend reality.
Jupilings: Please tell us about your interest in the relationship between poetry, music, cosmology and sensorial aspects of matter-
GF: Everything is connected, it is synesthetic, this relationship is omnipresent in our mind, we create this reality. When I listen to poetry, I think of music, then an image comes to mind, and I can feel a sensation, for instance: a shiver! Poetry would not be poetry without feeling it, thinking it is vernacular, everything that exists can be transformed into poetry, music, image, it is a matter of sensitivity. The way that art reaches us intrigues me greatly, from the media to our sensory systems. Starting with our very limited perception of the colors that consequently shape our reality. Thinking that we see only 3 dimensions makes me believe that we are babies who have just opened their eyes to the cosmos.
Jupilings: What inner force shapes your artistic concepts-
GF: Curious this question, I started to paint a little late, I always had many questions and theories about the life and creation of the universe, and I realized that this distressed me in a way, the painting was like letting go and organizing these thoughts, it made me materialize these ideas, I have very clear images in my head of things I never saw, painting them makes them real. It is like taking that energy out of a dimensionless plane and materializing the thought. This awakens my pleasure and an urge to create, it is pure magic, ritualistic. I feel alive and powerful before my existence.
Jupilings: How do you deal with setbacks-
GF: I solve it as soon as possible. I get on well with them; every day, I send flowers; I know they exist, so I choose to treat them well.
Jupilings: How do you deal with criticism-
GF: I like to receive criticism, especially when it instigates me to think differently, I make the most of it through reflection. I am my most prominent critic; I am not afraid to confront my own choices.
Jupilings: What is the role of art today-
GF: Interesting this question, I could answer with the phrase “The artist is the antenna of the race” by Ezra Pound, so the role of art is to print reality. I have always seen art as Politics, since the cave paintings, humanity has always looked for ways to express itself and use this tool as a positioning.
Jupilings: What’s the best advice you’ve ever heard-
GF: Everything has a positive side. Sometimes we forget, it’s always good to remember.
Jupilings: Do you have a favorite painting, film or any other creative media that inspires you and why-
GF: Everything inspires me, I listen to a lot of music, I love to take a trip down my record collection. I love cinema, I think the creative complexity that involves film production is excellent. But what inspires me most is nature, when I talk about it, I want to talk about everything, life, the universe, energy, God. This movement fascinates me; as there is continuity.
Jupilings: What are your thoughts on blockchain platforms for artists since it democratizes access to art-
GF: I believe there is room for both markets, art has several layers and interests. Nowadays, the artist can be independent; the internet plays a crucial role. As an independent artist, when you choose to leave the system of galleries and commissions, it has negative and positive points, like everything in life. It depends a lot on your goals, there is not only one right path, but there are also several.
Jupilings: What is your life motto-
GF: Time does not stop. Being aware of your existence and choices is the great key to not getting lost in the contemporary world. We don’t even exist anymore, so relax.
