Comic Art of Marco Rosestolato

In the recent Cosplay day held in Schio, I had talked to two writer-artists engaged in graphic books and comics. I have already written about my talk with Enrico ET Trentin.

Today, I want to write about the second writer-artist - Marco Rosestolato. The below image shows some examples of Marco's art-works (click on images for a bigger view).

Marco is a young artist and his artistic journey in the world of graphic and comic art started five years ago in 2021.  

Writer-Artist: Marco Rosestolato

About Marco: He is from Schio. Ever since he can remember, he was always passionate about comics and illustrated books. He started making artworks, when he was still young, as a self-taught artist.

Art Studies: When he was 23 years old, he joined a three-years long art course at the Comic-Art school in Padova.

After completing the course, he started making comics more seriously. He has participated in different comic-art competitions.

Important Works: Recently, he has worked hard to complete a graphic novel series called "Aiutaci Maestro" (Help Me Master), which he has published online. It is targeted at 16+ Young Adults.

"Help me Master" is about the monks of Gyaan Monastery, whose goal is gaining knowledge and reaching towards human perfection. The series is about their adventures in the  different dimensions of space-time continuum. (The image below has some examples of his work from this series).

He is very happy with the way the "Help me Master" has turned out. He looks at it as a first step of his carrier in the comic-art world. You can check this graphic novel series on Webtoons and Tapas.

Approach to Working: Marco uses a graphic tablet for designing, like a lot of modern graphic-artists. He finds it very practical and quicker for designing. At the same time, he also likes traditional drawing and art on paper and other materials.

Influences: As a reader, he defines himself as an omnivore in terms of the comics he reads and likes. He especially likes to look at the works of other young and emerging artists.

He thinks that it is great to have events like Cosplay in Schio, which allow him to interact with other kinds of artists, which can inspire him to trying new ideas and approaches in his art work.

Making a Living Out of Comic Art: Marco feels that having an economic success from making comic art is very difficult.  According to him, having success or not does not depend on having talent as an artist since he knows persons who are very talented but have not achieved a level of success.

His advise is to look at comic art as a creative way for young artists to explore self-expression, but not to think of it as a carrier. It helps in growing creatively, learning to express your ideas, and at the same time, to see what and how others are expressing themselves, to inspire others and to be inspired. His criteria for success is to see if you have something to say which is specific and honest, then you are a successful comic artist.

Marco's Art: You can see the examples of his artworks, how he designs his pages and how he develops his characters on his website as well as on his Instagram page.

In The End

It was wonderful to see how Marco has been able to follow his passion and develop as an artist. 

I feel that earlier it was more difficult to become a comic-writer-artist, because publishing comics is costly and finding a publisher and distributor is not easy. Today portals like Webtoon and Tapas, allow you to hone your skills, and if you are persistent, hard-working and talented, you can find your readers and followers. If you can persist, hopefully, one day a contract with an important publishing house may also come, but you can't plan that in today's world because technologies are changing so quickly and the impact of AI is difficult to foresee.

If you dream of writing and illustrating your own graphic books and comics, I hope that reading this post about Marco will inspire you to follow those dreams. As he says, it is difficult, if not impossible, to make a carrier out of this passion, but it is a great way to express your creativity.

*** 

Comic Art of Enrico ET Trentin

At the recently concluded Schio Cosplay festival, Breganze Comics had organised some tables for artists involved in making comic-art, to showcase their art and some of their published books. During the festival, I was able to speak to two of those writer-artists: Enrico Trentin and Marco Rosestolato.

This blogpost is about Enrico ET Trentin and our discussions. I will write another post about Marco Rosestolato. The image below presents some examples of Enrico ET Trentin's art (click on the pics for a bigger view).

Let me start with an introduction to Breganze Comics, the local group in Alto Vicentino area, which brings together the different artists involved in making illustrated books.

Breganze Comics

This is the 50th anniversary year of the Breganze Comics, which brings together and promotes the so called, "ninth art", the art of creating comics. They organise exhibitions, meetings with the authors, comic-art courses in the schools, etc. and support the growth of new artists-authors.

Comic Art or Graphic Art

I feel that there is no right word which defines the work of the persons making comic-art - their work is not limited to making "comics" targeted at teenagers, some of the books are adult fiction. Perhaps that's why some of them prefer calling themselves Graphic artists.

However, many of them are not only artists, they are also the writers of their stories and some of them also publish their books. So a better description for them can be writer-artist-publisher.

Writer-Artist Enrico ET Trentin 

Enrico has an art diploma from the Art Institute of Nove (VI) and has been engaged in making comics since 2001. He prefers making comics on humorous themes.

Important works: He started as an author for a magazine called "Prezzemolo" distributed by the well-known Italian theme-park called Gardaland.

Usually, author-artists of comics remain hidden and people only see their work. However, in May 2004, Enrico started an experimental blog-strip called NestoRe, in which he became visible, as he interacted with the character of his strip, making comments and having a dialogue. This experiment became a big success as the NestoRe comic-strip was reproduced in a large number of magazines, books and anthologies, and his name became familiar. NestoRe has a Facebook page, where you can take a look at some of its illustrations. (image below, the cover of a NestoRe book)

The fame achieved through NestoRe, brought Enrico in contact with a well-known Italian rock-band music group called Elio e Le Storie Tese. He asked the members of the rock-group to design the NestoRe comic strip number one thousand. Later, he also wrote and illustrated a series of books titled, "Storie Tese Illustrate", an authorised biography of the rock-band in 4 volumes between 2013 to 2016. This major creative work of Enrico is spread over 1400 pages and took almost 10 years to do research, write and illustrate. These volumes were sold at the concerts of the rock-band. (Below: the covers of the 4 volumes of Storie Tese Illustrate)

Since, 2021, he is engaged in another series of comics called "Gli Erquloidi" (the title can be loosely translated as the The Herculoids) about a group of tired heroes. He had first started making this comic while he was studying at the art institute in Nove 38 years ago. For this work, he does everything, from writing and designing to page-layouts and publication design. So far 17 comics of this series have been published, with about 650 illustration-panels. He says that he still feels the same enthusiasm for these comics that he used to feel as a sixteen years old in the school. (Left - Enrico with some volumes of Erquloidi)

Becoming a Comic Writer-Artist:  Enrico says that before becoming a writer and artist, he was and continues to be an avid reader, reading different genres of books. From his childhood, he had a special passion for illustrated story books, which stimulated his fantasies and allowed him to explore the imaginary universes. From a passionate reader, it was a natural evolution, in trying to understand how such stories were constructed, designing them and slowly improving his skills.

He Reads:  Enrico started with humorous comics because he loves most reading them, though he reads all the different genres. Among the other comics he likes to read are the super-heroes of Marvel universe, the Japanese Manga comics, the heroes of Bonelli and different French-Belgian authors.

His Evolution As a Comic Writer-Artist: In all these years, he has continued to work with the humorous comics but instead of working on characters created by others (for example, Prezzemolo for Gardaland) to his own comic-strip (NestoRe), to illustration (Storie Tese Illustrate) and now the comic books (Gli Erqucloidi), bringing together the experience from the last 25 years.

Use of Technology in the Comic Art: Enrico says that computers, graphic tablets and programmes can be useful if one does not wish to design and colour on paper. He feels that those who are used to designing on paper with pencils and colours, can easily use the technology, but it does not work the other way round.

He is not hostile to use of technology, after years of designing on paper with the China ink, he started designing NestoRe strips almost entirely in digital format. He mixes his use of traditional artwork with technology, using sometimes paper and pen and sometimes computers. For example, he designs on paper, then scans and uses a graphic programme for page layout and inserting the text.

The Future with AI: Enrico feels that AI and comics are not a good combination. Comics, both for stories and illustrations, should remain with "natural intelligence". The text of the comics should reflect the ideas and personality of the author and not the ideas copied from others. He feels afraid that someone who has been trained on models of work of others, can copy and come out with something similar instead of expressing original ideas.

His ideas about the design are also similar. He would prefer an error in the anatomy or an unbalanced perspective, instead of creating by taking or copying pieces of works and styles of different artists. The comic should continue to be a personal message of its author, and not something prepared by a machine - then what would be the use of us humans and anyway, AI does not have a sense of humour.

You can check Enrico's work on his Instagram page, and Facebook page. 

In The End

I grew up reading the Phantom comics and occasionally, Archies. At that time, I was not aware of serious fiction in the form of graphic novels. While growing up, the general attitude was that comics are not "books", they are only timepass and somehow inferior.

I was introduced to the Manga comics by my son in Italy and I could understand its attraction for young readers. However, it was not until I met some writer-artists and saw the kind of creative work that goes into creating a comic and a graphic novel, that I understood its importance as an art-form.

I feel that persons engaged in writing and illustrating stories need to bring together the different sensibilities and skills of narrative writing, designing, illustrating, directing and shooting films, and to do all this requires a different kind of creativity.

It was a pleasure to meet Enrico ET Trentin and to learn about his experiences as a writer-artist. 

*** 

St. Francis Church in Schio

St. Francis church is one of the older churches of the city. If you are visiting Schio, it is worth visiting it for its history and for the art-works. It is easy to visit, since it near the city centre. The only problem is that it is open for public only on the afternoon of the first Sunday of the month. In the image below, the bell-tower of the church can be seen on the left. (click on images for a bigger view). 

 An asymmetrical building surrounded by green hills, this church from 1424 CE is famous for a beautiful altar piece dedicated to St Catherine, painted by Francesco Verla. However, there is many other things to see in it.

This post is about the history and things to see in St Francis church. Let me start with a little bit of history. 

Historical Overview of St Francis Church 

St Francis church is located at the edge of a hilly forest area of Schio, known as Valletta. The hillocks around the church were originally known as "Monte degli Oliveti" (the Olive trees' Hill), because this area used to have many olive trees.

This area was known for its "lazzaretto", a place for housing the sick and homeless poor. The word "lazzaretto" is related to leprosy and perhaps in the past there were some leprosy affected persons there. However, over the years, such places were often used for keeping sick persons including those with plague and other illnesses such as tuberculosis and mental illness. 

Itinerant Franciscan friars arriving in Schio had built a chapel dedicated to Madonna on the Monte degli Oliveti in 1424. The sandstone statue of Madonna, installed in that first chapel can still be seen inside the church. Twenty years later, in 1446, the Bishop of Vicenza consecrated that chapel, and the event was marked by a plaque, which can still be seen on the wall near the entrance.

The church expanded quickly. By the end of 1400s, a Franciscan monastery was already active next to the church. The church-building had also been expanded and had a central and a lateral naves. Since, the other side of the central nave was already occupied by the monastery, and space on the hillock was limited, the church ended up as an asymmetrical building. A hundred years after the first chapel, by 1520 CE, the church as it looks today, was ready.

Important Artworks in St Francis

St Francis church has many things to see, among which the most important are: 

A Corberelli Altar with Inlaid Stones: The first Chapel in the lateral nave has a beautiful altar (left) made by the master stone artists of the Corberelli family from 17th century. The Corberelli (o Corbarelli) were from Tuscany and were specialised in making inlaid stone artworks.

The altar has an announcing angel on the left and a slightly ruined mosaic of Madonna on the right. The central part has 2 corberelli birds, identified by the pink spot on their breasts, as the legend says that the bird had hurt itself while trying to remove a spine from crucified Jesus' head. The inlaid stone work is very beautiful, made of stones in vivid colours, it looks like a painting.

There is another Corberelli altar in Schio in the San Giacomo church near Duomo, and another, better known one, in Santa Corona church in Vicenza.  

Altar Painting by Francesco Verla: This luminous painting about the spiritual wedding of St Catherine from 1512 CE is in chapel 3 of the lateral nave (right). It is the most famous art-work of this church.

Giorgio Vasari, the renaissance period art-historian, who wrote Le Vite in 1550 about the biographies of well-known artists of his time, called him as Francesco Veruzio, who was from nearby town of Villa Verla ("verla" literally means 'cherries'). His painting style was influenced by Pinturicchio and, especially, Perugino, with whom he had spent some time.

The Pala (artwork for the altar) is composed of a semi-circular top part, a narrow top panel and the main painting, a bottom narrow panel, and a frame. The figures, the composition, the use of light, and especially the figure of God as a man with long beard in the top part of the painting, reminds us of some of the famous works of Pietro Perugino. The "Putti", the baby angels in the top narrow panel are seen as typical figures painted by Verla - they seem like the many baby angels painted by Donatello. The bottom panel, showing the life of St Catherine, seems to show a hill with the castle of Schio, which was demolished a hundred years earlier. (The bottom panel of the altar piece, below - Schio's castle is a little to the left of the centre - click on the image for a bigger view)

The cult of St Catherine has older roots in this area, as shown by the St Catherine church and village on the Summano mountain, that looms over Schio. 

The painting was commissioned by one Mr Giovanni who was married to a woman named Lucia - both of them are represented in the painting as St Lucy on the left and St John Baptist on the right. Behind them are St. Agatha and St Joseph. There is a baby holding on to the leg of St Joseph, whose reference to this painting is not clear. The central figures are Madonna, baby Jesus and St Catherine covered with a rich golden and red brocade.

Verla had also done the frescoes decorating the top parts of the church walls, so do not forget to look up while visiting the church.  

Madonna statue: Chapel 4 in the lateral nave hosts the original Madonna statue from early 15th century - it is made with sandstone from Vicenza. The name of its sculptor has been lost. It has a renaissance like look and is beautiful. Later on it was painted in bright colours, which make it look like a wooden statue.  

Recently, a space was discovered in front of this statue, which held a curtain, which could be opened and closed with a lever. The curtain has a painting with a lever for pulling up a curtain, which was used for covering the statue during some rites and then removing it to show the Madonna. The painted curtain will be kept in the forthcoming Schio museum, which is supposed to open this year (2026).

A Francesco Maffei (1605-1660) Painting Above the Main Altar: This painting is from 1640s and has Madonna with the baby, along with St Francis, St Anthony of Padua,
Bernardino of Sienna and Ludvic of Tolosa. It is more gothic, Madonna seems as a two dimensional figure and not so expressive. 

The hidden Chapel: There is another Chapel (right) with an old San Bernanardino altar, which is now hidden after cloister 2 in a side wall. It was shifted in the past during some restructuring. On the wall near the old altar, there are a couple of coat-of-arms from notable Schio families, including that from the Toaldi family (it has a tree and a dog).

Tombs Inside St Francis 

Since early times, rich persons could ask to be buried inside the church by paying money. Having a tomb inside the church increased families' social status. During the Napoleonic period, many tombs were removed but even today, the cost-of-arms of some important local families can still be seen inside, especially in front of the altars.

For example, in front of the main altar, you can see the De Schio family-tomb with their symbol (left), a two tailed siren; the Marostica family tomb has a cherry tree on it, while Fantinelli family tomb has a baby.

There is a lot of pink sandstone used for the tombs - these rocks were at the bottom of the sea and which rose up when the African tectonic plaque hit Europe, creating Alps and pre-alps.

The Beautiful Chorus Room 

The ligneo (wooden) chorus room is behind the main altar. It is also from early 1500. It was carved wood seats on two levels for the monks. In the centre, it has a big leggio, used for keeping the hymn book.  The leggio can be rotated and has a compartment for keeping the books. A handcrafted and painted codice miniato manuscript was found here which is now kept in the civic library of Schio, not very far from the church.

There are 2 paintings in the chorus room, both are by Francesco Maffei from 17th century (the painting on the back wall has a family connection for me - it carries a plaque with a dedication to "Lino Raddino", my wife's brother-in-law). 

Fossils in the stones near the church 

The geological history of Schio's hills show that in the past, 20-40 million years ago, they were at the bottom of the sea and the movement of the tectonic plates of the earth's crust, had brought them up. The local sand-stones and rocks used in the walls outside the church has many fossils, which testify this geological history.

Guided Tours in St Francis 

You can always visit the church area from the outside, but to visit inside the church, you need to come to Schio on the afternoon of the first Sunday of the month - the church is open to public only on that day, from 3 to 6 PM. On that day, there is usually a guided tour around 4 PM. 

I have been to numerous guided tours to St Francis church and had been promising myself to write a post about it for many years. The last image below, shows the monument to St Bakhita outside St Francis church.

Every guided tour brings out some new aspect about this church. For example, during the last tour, we visited the side-room connected to the chorus room and saw some of the paintings of the Popes in this room that I had not seen before.

In the End

Most people visiting Italy can see the famous cities, such as Rome, Florence and Venice. People who have a passion for history, visit slightly less famous cities like Verona, Bologna, Naples and Padua. To be aware about the histories and treasures of small towns like Schio, is not possible for casual visitors and Italy has hundreds of such places.

So if you are visiting Schio, try to discover as much of its history as possible - visiting St Francis church and its environs can an important part of this discovery!

*** 

Favourite Works From Mutations 2025 Art Exhibition

This year, the theme of the contemporary art exhibition Mutazioni (Mutations) was "The Signs".

Mutazioni is an annual art event in our town, Schio (VI) in the north-east of Italy. It is usually organised around the end of autumn and the beginning of winter. 

Since this year's theme was a bit abstract, the exhibits were very different. A distinguishing feature of this years' exhibition was a series of exhibits from different countries of Africa from the personal collection of artist and art-collector Bruno Sandonà.

As always, there was a lot to see and admire in the exhibition. In this post, I want to present some of my favourite art-works from the Mutazioni 2025.

The picture on the left is from an installation created by a group of artists from a cooperative working with marginalised persons and disabled persons called Coop Libra that I had liked very much.

A few exhibits seemed familiar to me, they were similar to those presented in earlier editions of Mutazioni exhibitions. So I have excluded them from this list.

Let me start with a hand-painted dress. You can click on the images for a bigger view. 

Hand-Painted Silk by Daria Tasca and Annamaria Iodice

Daria Tasca from Treviso is known for her art combined with woven materials. This time, she was joined by Annamaria Iodice, a sculptor, painter, designer and performer from Naples.

The two artists took a piece of silk woven in early 1950s, hand-painted it and created a two-piece dress out of it, wrapped around a framework of iron, copper and aluminium. It was inspired by the digital prints of an art-work called "The Earthquake" by Slavia Janeslieva and Teona Milieva.

Last year, in the Mutazioni 2024 exhibition, Daria had joined with a ceramic artist Vania Sartori to create a somewhat similar artwork focusing on ceramics, while this year the focus was on painting. I think that works like this are important to remind ourselves that art may not only be in the exhibits but even be worn by persons.

Ceramic Dresses of Lorenzo Gnesotto

There was another artist in the exhibition focusing on wearables. He had used ceramics for creating "dresses", though his interpretation of this idea was completely different. 

Lorenzo is from Bassano del Grappa. His artworks included 3 quirky ceramic "dresses" made from Terracotta bound by elastic fibres. Through the use of different kinds of clays for making the terracotta pieces, it gave them different colours and designs.

More than dresses, they seemed like body-decorations. They also remind me of the metal nets and armours used by medieval soldiers to protect their bodies.

Origami Sculptures and Sound-Installations by Silvia Tedesco

This artwork was by Silvia from Vicenza and it included three round bases on which origami sculptures covered with resins were placed. At the same time, each sculpture was associated with a specific soundscape. In fact, she describes her art as "Talking Artwork".

One of the sculptures, called "the Soul Dance" had dragonfly-shaped origami, another called "Dream and Bubble Soap" had soap bubbles and the third one called "Carpe-Diem" had the Japanese Kohako-Koi fishes. Click on the image for a bigger view.

Monotype Incision Prints by Manuela Simoncelli

Manuela was born in Australia and has her workshop in Mussolente (VI). For the past few years, she has been experimenting with incisions. Apart from her work as an artist, she is also a Jazz singer.

 She had three monotype prints in the exhibition, they were titled Rhythm 1-2-3. One had the silhouette of a woman reading a book, second with a girl and third, a woman with a mobile phone. She first makes the incisions using soft-wax and dry-point and then uses toner transfer for creating unique monotypes.

Abstract Art by Stefania Righi

Stefania is from Vicenza and she had three paintings in the exhibition. Her art tends towards abstract, using mixed material techniques by using materials like stucco and cementite along the oil and acrylic colours to create textured art-works.

I loved her art. For example, the painted shown above, felt like looking at a Zen garden with its soft colours, and hidden forms and shapes that seemed to come out of and disappear in the fog.

Art Works by Bruno Sandonà

Bruno Sandonà from Pastina is both an artist as well as, an art-collector. In the Mutations 2025 exhibition, there were 3 of his artworks. It also had a whole section dedicated to his collection of the art-objects from Africa.

From his art works, I have chosen one of his paintings for this post (left). It had a raw energy and seemed to be inspired by his collection of African art.

I also liked his ceramic-leg sculpture in the exhibition.  

There was a big collection of art objects from different parts of Africa, especially from the countries of West Africa.

About his art-works collection from Africa, in the images below you can see a sculpture that has a kind of ritual container placed on the legs of the two persons. It is from the Dogon people in Mali.

Abstract Paintings by Davide Piazza

Davide Piazza is the president since 2003 of the well-known art-circle La Soffitta located in Vicenza. Apart from being a well-known artist, he is known as a teacher, as he conducts courses of oil painting.

In the exhibition, there were three of his artworks, all three were in shades of blue and yellow. They reminded me of lakes and sand-dunes, with undefined borders, and seemed to transmit serenity and joy.

Hyper-Realism of Giovanni Meneguzzo

Giovanni Meneguzzo, who presented 3 paintings in this exhibition is originally from Malo and now lives in Olmi di Treviso. Malo had 2 other artists from the Meneguzzo family (Giobatta and Corrado) but I am not sure if Giovanni is related to them.

His three paintings in the exhibition, were in hyper-realism style. One had the autumn leaves, another had a discarded cardboard box  used for a gift and the third had left over stuff along with with an old demijohn wine-bottle. I liked all three of them.

Giovanni started as a teacher in an art school. His passion has been to collect left-over stuff such as old leaves, clay, bottles, etc. and create his artworks based on them or by using them in his art.

Absence-Essence Installation by Francesco Risola

The installation had a tree-stump surrounded by dry and cracked earth, on which shadows of a moving tree-leaves were being projected. Thus, the essence or the echo of the tree that had been there in the past was being evoked in the installation by the projection of the shadows of the tree.

The artist seemed to focus his art to share his emotions about thoughtless and meaningless destruction of the nature.

I liked this installation and its idea of projecting the moving shadows of a tree on the tree-stump & cracked dry earth. I felt that it expressed very well the impermanence of life.

Sara Zilio's Flowing Matter

Sara Zilio is an artist from Schio. She had only one artwork in the exhibition, an acrylic painting that seemed like different colours flowing on a liquid surface, sometimes blurring and sometimes separate, tending towards each other like the extended fingers of man touching the divine in Michaelangelo's fresco in the Sistine chapel.

A friend who was visiting the exhibition with me, didn't like it, he said that it reminded him of snakes. So as you can see, choosing favourite artworks is very subjective and his choice of favourites would have been very different from mine. 

Flavio Pelligrini's Abstract Art

Pellegrini's work in the exhibition was one of the most unusual one for me in this exhibition. Pelligrini likes to work with wood, but not by creating usual wood sculptures. Instead, he uses his passion for information technology (IT) to create very unusual abstract art with the wood.

For example, you can click on it and enlarge the above image of Pellegrini's work to look at how he has created it by mixing together wood and IT. I felt that looking at it can be a transcendental experience, guiding our minds towards a meditation on infinity. 

To Conclude: Metamorphosis by Coop Libra

Let me conclude this post with another installation, which I liked very much.

It was a group work made by different persons from a cooperative based in Romano d'Ezzelino that works with marginalised and disabled persons. They had created it under the guidance of art-therapist Valentina Grotto.  

The installation had a mannequin in the centre, who represented the Butterfly-Goddess that is transforming from the Pupa to the Butterfly, and was covered by plastic bags. The central figure was surrounded by a spiral made from individual art-works on paper and clothes. 

Apart from the idea underlying this installation, I felt that visually it created a stunning impact.

If you liked looking at my favourite works from this years Mutazioni exhibition, perhaps you would like to check similar posts about previous editions of Mutazioni - 2021-22 edition and the 2024 edition 

*** 

Art and Dance: Two Passions of Lucio Mantese

As a child, Lucio Mantese had 2 passions - art and dance. Born in a humble family, where his father ran a Meat-shop in Schio, he went started working when he was fifteen. Yet, with his grit and determination, he has been able to create a life for himself, both as a successful artist and a dancer.

I am always trying to write about the creative persons, especially artists living in Schio and Alto-Vicentino, and it was a long time that I wanted to write about Lucio. He has an art gallery in the city and 2-3 years ago, I had told him that I wanted to interview him.

Recently (October 2025), there was an exhibition of five artists in the historical Toaldi Capra palazzo in Schio's city centre. Lucio was one of them. This gave me finally an opportunity to talk to him. This post tells his story in his own words. Click on the pictures for a bigger view.

Sunil: Lucio, you don't live in Schio any more, instead you live in Cogollo del Cengio. What happened, how did this decision of moving out came about?

Lucio: As a boy, I always wanted a home surrounded by greenery. I heard about this land in mountain in Cogollo del Cengio, which was surrounded by the forest and there I found the terrain to realise my dream. At that time, I didn't have enough money to buy it, so I had to take a bank loan, which I paid slowly. It is my dream home.

Sunil: Tell me about your interest for art.

Lucio: Already in the primary school, my teachers used to bring me the pictures of their children, asking me to make their portraits. This helped me to avoid mathematics, which I used to find very difficult. It was a God-given gift. When people ask me where did I learn painting, I tell them ask Pavarotti where did he learn to sing like that. It is a talent, a gift which I had.

Sunil: You didn't study art?

Lucio: I followed the great artists. For example, I learned from important painters who would make still life or landscapes. I could visit their art-studios, see them at work and learn from them. The person who first taught me art was Cesare Valle, though I am mostly self-taught. I did study for a couple of years at the Academia in Venice.

Another thing which helped me to learn art was an art-gallery owner who used to bring me renaissance period art for making their copies. I did this work for about 15 years and that was a big learning period for me, because to have the art-works of renaissance artists, to study them, to see how they had created and to recreate that. I was about 30 years old at that time when I started doing these copies of the famous art works.

Sunil: But the famous artists are so diverse, each with his own way of designing and using colours, how did you learn how to copy such different styles?

Lucio: I can copy only renaissance period art. This style requires that I first make a background like with water-colours, so that the art work does not start on a white canvas, but on another background such as grey. Then I let it dry. I work in layers and after each layer, I have to let it dry. This way of covering with layers of veils is important for renaissance period art.

For example, the blue cloaks that are part of the renaissance paintings by famous artists - I first paint it in black and white, and then with transparent veils of ultramarine or another shade of blue, I would cover it. The parts underneath which are dark remain dark and the parts which were white, they show the colours, but this gives a light to the colours.

Sunil: These specific techniques, how did you learn them?

Lucio: Now there are YouTube channels where you can learn everything, but I had the books of the famous artists in which they explained their way of working.

Sunil: Do you try to recreate such works with old pigments which were used in that period?

Lucio: No, I use the normal colours available in the market. Raffaello used beautiful pigments which continue to be beautiful even 500 years later. The modern colours, they started to be used by artists like Van Gogh, but his famous blues are becoming black. So we don't know what will happen to them.

Sunil: Among the renaissance period artists that you have duplicated, who do you like most?

Lucio: I love the works of Caravaggio. At the time he was painting, he was criticised because his figures looked real, they did not respect the artistic canons of that period. For example, look at the Madonna in this work, she looks like a poor pilgrim woman (points to a copy of a Caravaggio painting he has made). This is similar to our modern sensibility while many other renaissance figures in the paintings they are idealised, they look like the pictures of the saints.

Sunil: Tell me about this self-portrait, with the mountains and the river behind you.

Lucio: This is a recent work, I have painted myself sitting in my garden. It shows our mountains - Colletto di Velo, Summano and Pasubio. The one you call 'river', in reality there is a road passing there, I replaced it with a mountain path. I keep on making self-portraits and when I don't like it any more, I make a new one. I like this one because I think that it shows intensity.

Sunil: Apart from making copies, what other kind of paintings you like to make?

Lucio: I like the local landscapes of Veneto, I like to show them as dream-like landscapes. However, 90% of my work is making portraits commissioned by the people. They bring me the photographs. For example, a man brought me the picture of his wife when she was young and they had gone to some tropical country for their honeymoon. So when I made her portrait, I added more beauty to her and added a tropical background to it. He cried when he saw it, said that I had given him a wonderful memory of his wife.

Sunil: It is beautiful. How much time you need to make something like this?

Lucio: I am quick. Drying needs time, if it is a sunny day or I use a heater, it reduces that time. If we don't count that I can do it in a week.

Sunil: Do you paint everyday?

Lucio: From 9 in the morning, as long as there is sunlight, I am very disciplined. When I am working for too long, then I take a break by going to work in my garden. I look after the garden of our home.

Sunil: Apart from art, you are also passionate about dance, tell me about it.

Lucio: When I was twenty, there was a couple with whom I was very friendly, they loved dancing. Going out with them, I also started dancing, and I joined a dancing school. After the first lesson, I decided that I loved it and I wanted to do it for living. I saw the light, I said that I want to teach dancing. I studied dance in Padua, from one of the greats of dancing, a world champion and to learn from him I used to go to him from midnight till one in the night. Then became a professional and later opened my own dancing school.

I stopped the meat shop of my family that we had, even if my father was very upset about it, because that was the family activity - my father, brothers, grandfather had all worked there. Ten years later, he told me that he was wrong and that I had taken the right decision.

Sunil: Do you still have that dance school?

Lucio: Even though now I am old, but my dance school continues to work that to my son Daniele, who is twenty-six years old. He is national level dancer in Italy for standard dance and Latin dances. I took him to learn dance when he was six. Initially he was not very keen but I told him, when you grow up then you can decide if you want to continue it or not. When he became 18, he said that he wanted to continue it, he was already considered an A-level dancer. Eighteen is too late to start learning dancing, you need to start earlier. Thanks to him and his partner, our dancing school has found a new vitality.

Sunil: Thanks Lucio for giving me your time.  

You can check and contact him through Lucio's Facebook and Instagram pages, there you can also see pictures of his dance school and his son Daniele.

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Minotaur Myth To Talk About Diversity

The Greek myth of Minotaur was about the Minoan civilisation in the Crete island, around 3000 BCE.

In May this year, a theatre group (Campus Company) of Schio's Civic Theatre brought together the students from the different local schools to create a theatre performance on the myth of Minotaur, to talk about the themes of diversity and inclusion. (Click on the images for a bigger view)

This post is about that theatre performance called "Minotauro della Diversità" (Minotaur of Diversity).

Minoans and the Minotaur Myth 

Minoan was a Bronze age civilisation on the Crete island in the Aegean sea.

The myth says that king Mino didn't worship properly to the God Poseidon and the angered God made his queen fall in love with a bull (Taurus). Thus the queen gave birth to a ferocious half-man, half-bull creature called Minotaur, who was closed inside a labyrinth. King Mino asked Athenians to send human sacrifice for Minotaur. An Athenian young man called Theseus offered to be the sacrifice for Minotaur. He killed Minotaur and was able to escape the labyrinth with the help of a string given to him by the king's daughter who loved him.

Minotaur As a Symbol of Diversity

The symbolism of Minotaur for a child with disability seems very obvious. Manny civilisations had superstitions which saw disabled or diverse children as inauspicious and harbingers of bad luck.

In Italy, over the past couple of decades, there has been large scale migration and today the children of the migrants form a significant part of the students in Schio's schools. Thus, using the Minotaur's myth as the theme of a theatre performance was important to raise questions about and to discuss the issues of diversity and inclusion.

Civic Theatre of Schio

 The Civic Theatre of Schio is managed by a Foundation and it has different projects to promote community engagement and participation in its activities. The theatre was built in early 20th century through an initiative of industrialist Alessandro Rossi with active contribution of the citizens. Over the last few years, it has been repaired and restored to its old glory.

Apart from theatre performance, its activities include Campus Lab (to promote theatre among children and young adults) and Dance Well (dance therapy for persons with Parkinson and elderly persons).

Performance of Minotauro Della Diversità

The performance was the result of a workshop for the students and was directed by Ketti Grunchi (Piccionaia company) and Delfina Pevere. Around 30 students from different schools of Schio took part in it.

The stage set-up was simple and minimalist. A square wooden frame with curtains represented the palace or queen's room. Stones placed on the floor represented the labyrinth. All the actors had plain dark-grey pants and T-shirts, and the addition of a crown or a white mask denoted the king and Minotaur. Long pieces of curtain like materials held on the two sides, made the sea-waves. Persons on the stage were accompanied by readers, who sat on the stairs and provided commentary.

The images used with this post will give you some idea about the performance.

Conclusions

While watching the performance, I was thinking that I would have loved to take part in something like this when I was in school. We did do some plays in School, but they were really basic. While this performance with experienced play-writes and director, technical support though lights and sound, and the kind of preparation that must have gone into making it, would have been at a completely different level.

I think that it is wonderful and we are incredibly lucky that even in our tiny town of Schio, we have such a theatre and similar initiatives which contribute in stimulating creation for the students and a better quality of life for all of us residents.

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Sareo 2025 Street Art Festival

Schio's annual street art festival "Sareo" was held in the last week of June 2025. During this festival, the artists living in and around Schio are invited to put up their recent works for display in Via Pasubio in the city centre.

The old name of Via Pasubio was Via Sareo, which explains the name of this festival, which goes back to almost fifty years - it was suspended during the Covid years. The image below shows a view of the street with the art works. (You can click on any of the images below for a bigger view)

I want to share some of the art-works from this year's festival, that I liked. Our response to creative works including art, poetry, books, is very subjective. Thus, I am sure that some of the works that I liked, may not seem special to you and you would have chosen completely different works.

I am very fond of water-colour landscapes but this year, I didn't find any such landscape which I found outstanding. However, I also like abstract compositions and there were a few this year, which I liked.

These artists-artworks are not in any particular order.

Winner of Sareo 2024 - Giannino Scorzato: A jury of artists chooses the best artist, winner of Sareo festivals. Last year's winner was Giannino Scorzato from Valdagno. This year,  a solo exhibition of his works was held at the Toaldi-Capra palazzo as a part of Sareo festival.

A self-taught artist, Scorzato is also a mountaineer. He had started with oil paintings, but now he expresses himself mainly in beautiful and amazingly detailed pencil sketches. You can see one of his works from this exhibition in the image below, a portrait of a young girl.

I thought that this landscape by Teresa Vallese captured very well the special light, the landscape and the sea of Mykonos island, with its white houses, with its predominent blue and white colours in a simple way.

I liked the next painting because of its palette of pale colours, the diaphanous-delicate look and the way the flowers and abstract designs foreground the female figure. It is by Antonia Bortoloso from Schio, who is known for her feminine portraits and figures. There were two of her works in this edition of Sareo and I liked both of them. 

The next work has Australian aboriginal masks in pointillism style by Raffaella Rigadello - it reminded me of Andy Warhol's pop-art posters because of their colours and graphics. A handwritten note fixed near the artwork, probably written by the artist, pointed about the subjugation of Aboriginal people in Australia by the European settlers.

Mari Baldisserotto's water-colour of a beautiful girl with blue eyes made me think of the photograph of the Afghan girl by Steve McCurry which was used as cover-pic for National Geographic in 1985. I liked its colour composition and the girl's expression.

I like the way Giuseppe (Beppe) Fochesato uses shafts of light in his interiors. He had a few works in the festival and the one I have chosen has an old portico, probably from an old church with a door at the end. I love its colours and atmosphere.

The next is a water-colour by Egidio Carotta and it has a flower-pot fixed to the wall next to a gate. The painting gets its charm from the contrast in the colours of the bricks of the house, where red bricks are used to create a visual impact and give a shape to the painting.

I also liked the delicate flowers in the water-colour painting by Emanuela Minà from Schio. It had beautiful colours and composition. She also had another water-colour painting in the exhibition, but I liked this one more. 

The painting of a black galleon ship against an abstract background dominated by green colour, made me think of the film Pirates of the Caribbean and captain Jack Sparrow. I liked its dream like abstract effect. It is by Fabiola Carmelini.

Let me conclude by 3 works which I liked most in this year's Sareo. The first is an abstract composition by Luigi Bernardi. I would have preferred its lower part to be less definite and with paler colours, but still I found it intriguing.

The second is titled "Boy with a neckless" and is by Lorenzo Zanello. I liked its colours and the guy's expression. Every time I looked at it, it made me smile. It also reminds me of a guy I knew.

My favourite piece of art this year was this abstract work by Claudio dal Prà from Chiuppano. I am not able to explain why I liked it but I loved its complex colours, hidden figures and its composition. I like art which pulls me in and I can spend a long time trying to understand why I like it.

Conclusions

I think that it is very difficult for an artist to create a completely distinctive style, so that as soon as you see it you can say that it is by that artist. This also means that when you see works that use that style, you can say that this artist is inspired by that one.

However, developing a distinct style can also become a prison - then people expect you to keep on repeating that style forever. In that sense, creating a style of abstract art is much better because it can give you more freedom as an artist.

Regarding the artists whose works I have presented in this post, I was surprised that only a few of them have a social media presence. I feel that many of them, especially those who have not sacrificed years of life in the pursuit of art and have done other works while keeping art as a passion for the weekends or retirement, feel shy of calling themselves as artists and talking about their art.

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