Emiliano Ponzi is now recognized as one of Italy’s leading international illustrators. With a career spanning more than two decades, Ponzi has collaborated with some of the most prestigious brands and media, from Apple to Tiffany, from the New York Times to Le Monde. But his art, made of visual elegance and conceptual depth, does not stop at commissioned illustrations: the exhibition Together, at Philippe Labaune Gallery in New York, represents the evolution of his artistic language, which explores the intimacy of human relationships through painting on canvas. In this interview, Ponzi tells us about the path that led him to this new phase and impressions of the reverse development: from the digital world to the gallery world.
Hello Emiliano and thank you for being here. Let’s start directly with the event: tell me about this exhibition, how did it come about?
“I come from a twenty-odd year career in what can be considered commercial illustration. ‘Commercial’ because it identifies work for clients; I’ve worked for Apple, New York Times, Louis Vuitton, Moleskine: in short, the world of commissioned illustration. Everything is digital. Then, for the last 4 years, I felt this need to also transport the aesthetics and content of my illustrations into a gallery world. What is considered, I don’t know if rightly or wrongly, art with a capital ‘A’. I started a path of painting, acrylic on canvas, and I did my first four exhibitions in a gallery that is based in Milan-Marco Rossi Arte Contemporanea-where works by good, seasoned, Italian artists are shown. An important gallery for many years. From there, let’s say in the middle of this project, I moved to New York: here I found Philippe Labaune Gallery, where the exhibition Together will be held, from November 7. This exhibition represents 14 large paintings on canvas, so acrylic on canvas. There are also a series of studies on paper, in pencil or ink, that go to tell the world of a relationship. For each painting I wrote lines of text, as if it were a diary page that one and the other of the couple write about what they think about a certain situation, a memory, a moment spent together, a separation. It’s as if I started from these imaginary diary pages and then drew those, not in a didactic way, but as if I drew the feeling transposed from the diary page to the painting.”
You used the word “imaginary,” so I ask you, is this an autobiographical work or is it the result of an inner necessity, an artistic discourse? Where does the inspiration come from?
“On the one hand, as I said at the beginning, there is always autobiography: we have all had experiences-in relationships, certainly, we have, we have been on the side of right from time to time, on the side of wrong, we have been angry with our partner or companion, frustrated, we have loved, we have been loved, we have not reciprocated… on the one hand there is obviously an autobiographical part. It is peppered, however, with fiction as well, because it has to be universally leveled and understandable to everyone. There is a part that responded to a desire: to find meaning. Whether it is commercial illustration or not, in my opinion art has to tell a story. I feel the need that every image must tell a story, be a frame of a longer film. The right frame, but of a longer film. There has to be a perception of a story, which is told through that frame.”
What do you expect the audience’s feelings to be at the exhibition?
“I hope to have made images that are detailed but not too detailed, so that the audience can find a blank space in each of the paintings and project a personal feeling related to what they see. For example, there is a painting in which two very small people and a sunset, snow-capped mountains are depicted. Although it is a very large painting it is quite empty, there are not many details. I hope that someone can imagine, looking at it, that time they went to the mountains–perhaps not necessarily with their partner or companion, but with their family–that time they remember the smell of snow, or the warm light of a sunset over snow, that is, the cold, fleeting temperature of winter. I hope to be able to arouse, to move something. That it is precisely a memory, a memory or an untied feeling. That it can be activated as if the paintings act as triggers and make sensations activate.”
You told me at the beginning that this transition from digital to gallery is seen a bit like the transition to art with a capital “A.” Do you feel more like an artist now or have you always felt like an artist?
“That’s a very good question, I have to say that the process I follow is clearly the same. If the New York Times calls me and says ‘look, there’s this article to illustrate,’ or another client says there’s this other illustration to prepare… however you start from a story, my thought process is the same, I didn’t follow a different process. The journey is the same but the landing changes, in my opinion: it’s one thing to have a digital image that can be replicated thousands of times, infinite times. And then it’s true, there are NFTs, there is the whole aspect of digital art that can be sold, certified as a unique piece. And I’ve had that experience as well. I did a series of NFTs with Giuliano Sangiorgi of Negramaro, who set them to music. It’s true, though, that having the unique, real piece means having a piece where the artist really put himself on the line. For example, if you make a mistake on the computer it’s easy to correct it; if you do it on a painting it’s trouble, it’s not like you go back. There is a relationship with the mistake, a relationship with the material, a relationship with the body. Painting tires, there is also a relationship with technique, finding the right color … it’s a different approach. I think it is very nice that a painting, besides being unique, is also perishable. Perishability is a valuable thing: today it is, in ten years it will be ruined. It has a value like the human being who ages, changes, mutates. Whereas the digital file, you know, you keep it in a hard disk, you keep it on a cloud, in a hundred years it’s the same.”
How many years have you been in New York? And how has this move helped you with your career? What advice would you give to artists like yourself? On getting to New York, what New York can offer….
“I’ve been here in New York for a little over two years. I think what it gives you, clearly, is a broadening of the experience. First of all because it’s clear that in Italy – but it comes to say Europe in general -, everything is much smaller. The market is smaller, people are more equal. Here people are different from each other; in a city like New York you meet different people, you have different experiences, and this increases what is the perception of you. It enriches you because you compare yourself with each other; that’s the most useful thing. The advice I would give to an artist is: come aware that America is not the America of the American dream that we’ve always been told, but it’s a place-at least New York, tough and unforgiving. There’s a lot of competition, living here has a cost – both in terms of money and in terms of energy -, it’s a very tired city. So it is important to try to come with clear ideas. You can no longer come with a cardboard suitcase, you can no longer think naively as you could until maybe twenty or twenty-five years ago. It is a place where you have to already know what you are looking for, and at that point you probably find it. You find it sooner than in Italy or elsewhere.”
The article Emiliano Ponzi narrates <i>Together</i>, the exhibition at <i>Philippe Labaune Gallery</i> comes from TheNewyorker.
