Matter, time, joy
Between geology and archeology, Filippo Rossi's latest exhibition shifts the artist's material interest in a direction that is both new and ancient: towards stone, experienced in the mystery of its slow stratification but also in the charm of the unexpected reconfigurations to which it is subject. A first series of works, of smaller dimensions, explores the phenomenon of "geological time", offering curiously reassuring visions of the overlapping or juxtaposition of layers of a stone between marble and travertine: white, light gray or ferrous; a second series, with larger works, re-proposes the same stone after thousands of years, already excavated, cut, used in constructions reduced to fragments, finally recomposed in asymmetries that seem the road maps of lost cities. In each series, then, among the layers and fragments of mottled and eroded stones, surprising and exciting colored and golden shapes emerge, as if in the heart of the earth and in the ruins of ancient civilizations joy were revealed to be the hidden treasure from the beginning and beyond. the apparent end of things. Beyond the eternal horizon towards which he has guided us in recent years, Rossi now immerses us in time — but in a time whose story is, from start to finish, tinged with hope.
Msgr. Timothy Verdon. Director, Museo dell’Opera del Duomo, Florence
I am pleased that the Tuscany Region is hosting an exhibition by the painter Filippo Rossi in the rooms of Palazzo Bastogi. Filippo Rossi is one of the few artists in Italy to focus on two themes that seem very contradictory: on the one hand sacred art or better art in a Christian context, on the other abstract art or more precisely "non-figurative ". Filippo Rossi is a Christian inspired artist. His art has a dimension of the sacred with purely artistic intuitions of abstract art. God is a being of pure spirit who, however, can be metaphorically represented under the guise of a man. The exhibition of this Florentine artist represents an artistic phenomenon in contrast that wants to carry on the search for the metaphysical and symbolic contents of spirituality to a large public. I wish the artist that this prestigious exhibition will be only a stage in a career that is still full of satisfactions.
Paolo Bambagioni. Regional councilor
When, a few years ago, I visited an exhibition by Filippo Rossi, I confess that I was immediately strongly impressed. It doesn't often happen that a pictorial art based on abstractionism arouses emotion and amazement in me. With Rossi's works this has happened and still happens. The technique and the support - canvas, jute or wood - may vary, but in front of each of his creations it is difficult to remain indifferent. The shapes, the strength of the colors and their combinations, and even the titles of each work are brilliant and of great impact. You feel, in an almost sensorial way, that you are in front of true works of art. Because it is art when, in any form, figurative or abstract, it doesn't matter, it strikes and moves. And it is no coincidence that many of Rossi's favorite themes have to do with the spirituality of man. One of the characteristics that mark this young Florentine artist is precisely his particular ability to evoke and give form and expression, with the extraordinary and mysterious language of abstract art, to spiritual motions and transcendent references, which in its forms and impacts of color approach human reality and illuminate it.
Marco Carraresi. Advisor secretary of the Bureau of the Regional Council of Tuscany
