Page 11 - Petru Russo | The 100 Days of Decameron by Giovanni Boccaccio

was the first author capable of dominating the most different subjects, both plot derived from his pure, fantastic, visionary world, in witch emerges symbolic
from a social-historical and popular-dialectal point of view, with that distance presences, archetypal and mysterious.
that belongs to the artistic discipline. I think that this example is very important
not only for those who create illustrations for books, but also for those artists
His sheets are precious for their vivid, but softened chromatic that insinuates
who confront themselves with this gigantic masterpiece’s provocation.
among the spaces made by a skillful etching mark aware of the expressive
qualities of that medium. In front of Russo’s engravings, we have the
Boccaccio dominates the subject. He reconsiders the epic plot and at the sensation of being in the front of ancient miniatures, singularly “oriental”,
same time, frames it inside the rigorous structure of the “Decameron,” within suddenly animated by tensions enchantments, empiric but actual starts
sentences where the liveliness of the quip and the dialectal allusion obey the and plots. Undoubtedly, there is a surrealist component in Russo’s figurative
discipline of a rhythm. A rhythm, distinguished by participles with a Latin flavor, world that gives to the author the freedom to reach a fantastic dimension
and by everything that recalls the rules, the refined modalities of creating a as space of visionary revelation - here we can’t forget the great lesson of
phrase with nobility, as is in the tradition of ancient rhetoric. This mixture of the Romanian Brauner, with his peculiar, archetypal surrealism. We spoke
promiscuous vividness that forms Boccaccio’s subject and, at the same time, about a ”double dimension of technological mechanics and organic unity”.
high artistic discipline, seems to me a theme that deserves consideration Actually, the visionary world of Petru Russo seems to allude to both those
from anyone who wants to approach this text. It is important to feel pushed dimension, as two competing archetypes in the folds of our reality. They
to a certain attitude, as Russo did exhaustively dealing with the “Decameron” seem to be indistinguishable inside his visionary plot, where the explicit
universe. components are just the floating presences of surreal symbolic figures. Those
dimensions remain at the stage of spheres of allusion. They are references
of the mechanical plot of our contemporary world and of the iconic plot that
In Petru Russo’s artwork the imaginary seems to develop with an accent of
chases us daily. But they are even references of a remote organic root, of
visionary expressionism rather dramatic, arousing, excited. This particular
an anthropological truth on which are based the motivations of a visionary
artistic attitude tests the reality through the upcoming of a symbolic-oneiric
symbolism, like Russo’s one.
awareness and in a sharpening that could even change into a scream. It is a
painting of profound, psychic investigation. A violent confession of anguish.
Russo’s is crowded by presences, which bring dramatically back the reality to a Petru Russo comes from Transylvania. His art seems influenced by some
truth of archetypes, that the artist put in contrast with the leveling of the daily expressionist masters: Kokoschka in his best period (1914), with his unique
horizon. chromaticity and his particular way of considering the space of the page;
Kandinsky, with the twisty strength of his image. Consequently, we can easily
say that the artistic attitude of Petru Russo is like a sort of dialogue around
In this engraving work, this visionary attitude is more accentuated by a
the origins of middle European Expressionism. Nevertheless, here the artist
narrative easing. It loosens the dramatic tension. It gains the pleasure of a pure
privileges the game among historical-stylistic connotations, which overcomes
dreaming-about. It becomes lighter, ironic, motioning. The plot moves towards
that main quality: suddenly he wants to reach a formal mechanism verifiable
dimensions of pure imagination, as it happens in the exercises of a machine
in the entire cycle dedicated to Calendrino, with all those lamentable cases
that belongs to the world of fantasy.
that Boccaccio assigns him. It is a mechanism comparable to some tendencies
of modern art: the mechanical anatomy of Picabia’s drawings, Duchamp, the
The characters come alive in a metamorphic dimension. They cross each other facetious combination of Tinguely and Luginbuhl, where the sense of humor
into fantastic spaces. They are free from every logic, apart from the one based doesn’t exclude an accent of restlessness.
on the necessity of their narrative plot. The same narrative plot that Russu’s
fantasy has developed in a game of possible analogies with the text.
In Russo’s work, these mechanisms are easily comparable to an inner organ.
Russu’s figurative tales are not descriptive. They are only in connection with the
The funnels, the crutches, and all the mechanisms of that artistic tradition
text for a pure, fantastic solicitation that the artist renews time after time. The
become in some of his engravings similar to the movement of the watches in
text is a sort of pretest to stimulate his own taste, his own genius for a narrative
Callot’s engraving, a world in which this dimension has already gone through
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