Antonio’s paintings exist within psychological landscapes as possible myths. Unafraid to show the leakages between cultural and personal narratives, they favor an intuitive erotica and mythological conspiracy. His body of work develops around considerations of religion, reality and myth, relying on the use of archetypal iconography, transparency and color.

The paintings meditate on the sacredness of wilderness, engaging with play, blasphemy and imagination as moments related to the honesty of attempts; and to the potential honesty of paint. Sometimes upside down, other times lengthened into their unavoidable sensuality, the figures he offers are mirrored and multifaceted, they ripple and refract like water in a boat.

The way paint is applied sometimes mimics the dense thicket of a jungle, where one eventually arrives to encounter a grotesque ape feeding on its genetic ancestry or the phallic posture of a palm tree. Through layers of hyper-liquid mediums and the patient unraveling of saturated primary colors, the paintings conjure a muddy marsh that powerfully interlaces probing and revealing.

Antonio’s deliberate exposures disclose the similarities between our seemingly unlike nature and trick us into understanding – (or at least relating). I remember him explaining to me in his studio the anthropomorphism of his characters, standing in front of one of his paintings for “size reference”, arms outstretched like Jesus on the cross.

– Giorgia Alliata