Riccardo Guarnieri

Riccardo Guarneri was born in Florence in 1933. After having studied figurative arts, Riccardo Guarneri starts painting in 1953 contemporarily to a passion for music: the artist plays jazz and classic guitar. After a figurative starting point, the artist let himself being fascinated about Informal artistic movement, focusing on the relationship built with light, which, since the very early beginning, caused his pictorial research. He exposed on a solo exhibition for the first time in 1960 at Carlarle de Posthoorn, in L’Aja. In 1962, the artist starts being interested in color as light and in Handwriting as painting and subsequently, the trinomial sign-light-color will become indissoluble. Consequences are his extremely bright and light paintings, in which surfaces are delimited by traits of graphite. From early 60s Riccardo Guarneri takes distance from Informal artistic movement to amplify his research about light and in doing so, he travels around North Europe. The results of these travels are ultra light colors, almost whites. In 1963, Riccardo Guarneriwith Gian Carlo Bargoni, Attilio Carreri and Gianni Stirane form the Gruppo Tempo 3, which program, originating from Marc Rothko and german Theorie Gestalt (theories of perception), tends to exceed Informal artistic movement. During these years, the artist participates to several exhibitions along with the other group componets: in 1963, at Galleria XXL Marzo in Venice; in 1964, at Galleria Aquilone in Florence; in 1965 at Teatro Politeama Genovese in Genua. In 1964, his pictorial research becomes more rigorous. In 1966, the artist participates to Biennial in Venice and several solo exhibitions follow, in particular the one in 1967 at Galleria La Carabaga in Genua and in 1969 at Galleria Fiori in Florence. During the following decade, Riccardo Guarneri accomplishes pivotal research studies on his way to paint that leads him to conceive it as a place, representation of a space detemrined by encounter of color, geometry and light. From internal characteristics of Riccardo Guarneri‘s  light and at the same time strong works, evocative and mysterious, he could be considered the precursor of Analytical Painting artistic movement. In 1969, Riccardo Guarneri‘s painting continues to perfectionate. Paintings, that are understandable only across a prolounged observation, take origin in this period, but at the end the structure has to counterpart with a light that destroy it. Among other than hundred solos exhibitions, some of them are to be mentioned: un 1972 at Westfälischer Kunstverein in Münster, at Galleria Morone in Milan; in 1973, at Galleria del Cavallino in Venice; in 1974, at Galleria Godei in Rome and Studio La Città in Verona; in 1976 at Galerie December in Düsseldorf; in 1989, at Galleria Il Ponte in Florence; in 2004 at Sale del Fiorino at Galleria D’Arte Moderna, Palazzo Pitti in Florence. In 2000, Riccardo Guarneri fullfills a project of a mosaic measures twentyfour meters, that nowadays is placed to ‘Lucio Sestio’ metro stop in Rome.