CLAUDIO DE COL
Claudio De Col's works must be interpreted on two different levels. The first one is the subject depicted, almost always a woman – his romantic obsession – with large, intense eyes; profiles and smiles from 15th-century Madonnas; and voluptuous bodies indulging shamelessly in being observed by others. The second relates to the complex and elegant interweaving of materials and the sundry techniques used by the artist to create something other than a simple support or a decorative element. For De Col, technique is not a tool in service of a style or the figurative content. Rather, the technique itself is the style, simultaneously starring in a story with several influences, in which image, material, and technique incarnate the diverse and complementary aspects of women, with the latter being an emblem of the generative and transformative power inherent in the creative act. In other words, we could say that more than being in love with women, De Col is in love with the female universe and everything that it represents and invokes on an artistic plane. As a result, he uses his extraordinary technical expertise to form and transform not just the sensual shapes, perfectly oval faces, and curvilinear bodies, but also the various stages of the materials used by the artist to create something new, something that was not there before. For De Col, art is the Greek techne, the "savoir faire", which transforms and produces a new shape from the amorphous chaos of the many materials and techniques used in turn by the artist. Likewise, no greater tribute can be paid to women than to celebrate them, as Claudio De Col does, through the infinitely exquisite mystery of artistic creation.
[Daniela Pronesti']
FB. Art C. De Col