10 Questions with Maristella Rana

Maristella Rana was born in 1975 and grew up in Bari in a stimulating and lively environment. After high school, she spent seven years in Venice, where she perfected the technique of oil painting, and worked as a painter and illustrator. The Venetian period profoundly marked her artistic identity, thanks to the continuous exchange with artists, painters, writers, and philosophers who were part of her entourage.

After Venice, Rana spent three years traveling between Italy and Luxembourg due to frequent cultural and artistic collaborations often facilitated by the Italian Cultural Institute.
She arrived in Milan in 2005, where she completed a three-year program in Illustration and Multimedia Animation at the European Institute of Design (IED). Parallel to her studies, Rana worked in creative roles in the advertising and communication industry in Milan.

Rana's prolific production found outlets in public and private collaborations with magazines and cultural organizations. During these years, she participated in the Salone del Mobile. In 2008, she presented a series of etchings entitled "Sedia" and collaborated with Benetton on a collective art project. During this time, Rana's pictorial language matured, influenced by Intimism and meditation. Her art approached the colorism and visual immediacy of American abstract expressionism.

Committed to expanding her artistic horizons, Rana worked on various theater projects, including Onlus Stravaganza. For the show "Ostinati e contrari" she managed creative direction and developed imagery for video scenography of the song "Ho visto Nina volare."

From 2010 to 2021, she worked as a manager in the retail sector, directing with the development of stores, organizing training, positioning products on the Italian market, and launching advertising campaigns. Her clients included the British brands Kurt Geiger and LUSH the Italian brand Geox.
During this time, Rana continued to pursue her artistic research and experimentation and deepened the links between fashion and art, marketing and communication, and image and sales.

In 2022 Rana focused her research on investigating child psychology and personality disorders linked to individual experiences. Part of her recent artistic production revolves around these themes and establishes a dialogue with experts in the field of psychology.
In June 2022, Rana presented three works at the sixtieth anniversary of Marguttiana Arte, a historical event sponsored by the municipality of Forte dei Marmi and the Ugo Guidi Museum.
In July and August 2022, as an artist in residence on the island of Gran Canaria, Rana conducted research and worked on a large landscape installation made with colored stones and other natural materials.
In November 2022, one of Rana's works will be on display at the FMArt Studio Gallery in Monza.
In Ostuni, Puglia, her works are exhibited at the Contemporary Art Gallery LA BOTTEGA DELL'ANGELO.

www.maristellarana.com | @maristellarana

ARTIST STATEMENT

In a polyphony and symphony of colors, each work by the artist Maristella Rana is the epiphany of the artist's inner voice as the observer. Rana's works document a gradual process of purification that leads to the disappearance of every recognizable symbol and subject. Each work is a representation of ideas, images, and signs achieved through liberating gestural brushstrokes that signify a trace of what has gradually disappeared. The bright and impetuous color becomes the subject of the work and occupies the entire canvas surface. The color is the primary vehicle of Rana's spontaneous and reckless inner language. In this transformation of language into color, she plays with the viewers' gaze and invites them to have fun within the physical limitations of the work in a constant search for a focal point. For the viewers, the search for focus does not find immediate fulfillment, but instead generates a sense of fascination inherent in art.

Close to the lesson of American abstract expressionism, the pictorial language of Maristella Rana can be considered a warm and poetic abstraction in which rational meaning gives way to the expressive sense and to the visual narrative. Rana's work combines the immediacy of the graphic signs with the dense chromatic force of suggestions.

In a period in which the artist is called to make the invisible visible in a liquid and frenetic society full of images, Maristella Rana, through her works, invites the observer to stop looking and thinking continuously and instead connect with the more intimate part of the ego. In the words of the French philosopher J. Baudrillard, the "characters of shock, strangeness, surprise, restlessness, and liquidity as well as self-destruction, instantaneity and unreality" which can be traced in each of these works, allow us to delve beyond the limit of the known and the knowable by overcoming what is clear and visible, surprising and always moving us.

INTERVIEW

First of all, tell us a little more about your background, and how did you begin making art?

Drawing has attracted me since childhood because I was intrigued by the idea of creating shapes. I perceived the connection between images and concepts that the images can imply. While observing a young painter who used to visit my family, I discovered that art had an organized system with tools, timing, and thought. I spent whole afternoons drawing and experimenting until I was eighteen, moved to Venice, and discovered its cultural heritage. In Venice, I trained in the studio of a Venetian painter for seven years, working with oil painting on portraits and landscapes. At twenty-one, I began to exhibit in collective exhibitions and was commissioned paintings and book illustrations. The Venetian period was important for my cultural formation and artistic evolution. After years of researching form, I rejected it and replaced it with fluidity and dissolving boundaries, thus arriving at my personal experience of abstraction. In my path of growth and study, I loved to exchange ideas with other artists. I remember how meaningful my visits to the studio of a German friend and sculptor, who shared these words: "forget the form, synthesize, dissolve the figure...".
Later, I attended the European Institute of Design (IED) in Milan, where I completed my training in Illustration and Multimedia Animation. While studying, I continued my artistic production and also performed creative work in the advertising and communication industry. In 2008, I participated in Salone del Mobile in Milan with a series of etchings, "Sedia," and collaborated with Benetton on a collective art project. In 2010, I participated in the project of the Onlus Stravaganza for a theater show "Ostinati e contrari" I collaborated on the creation of a video for the scenography of the song "Ho visto Nina volare" by Fabrizio De André. I set the creative direction and developed imagery for the video. Also, in Milan, I transitioned from the advertising sector to retail, working in various management positions from 2010 to 2021 for Italian and English companies. My artistic training served as the foundation for this work and allowed me to deepen the links between fashion and art, marketing and communication, and image and sales.
In 2022 I focused my research on investigating child psychology and personality disorders related to individual experiences. Part of my latest artistic production revolves around these themes and establishes a dialogue with experts in the field of psychology.

How did your work evolve over the years? And how would you describe your work and yourself as an artist today?

I think of my artistic production as a mirror and as an extension of myself. My work has evolved along with my personal transformation. The form has given way to color, darkness has been conquered by the light; art has brought healing to my life.

Can you tell us about the process of creating your work? What aspect of your work do you pay particular attention to?

The creation process is born after a long phase of reflection and elaboration. When intuition or a thought catches my attention, I descend into its abyss like an explorer. I try to reach its bottom, its essence. Only after I fully experience it, I synthesize this thought into an experiment that explodes on canvas or on paper. 
In this process of physical realization of a concept, I pay attention to the materials and carefully choose the paper to work on. Its texture guides me on where and how to place the color. I need to feel the materials I work with, to connect with them through a sense of happiness. Light has an important role in my artistic process. I often travel in search of a special quality of light and spend long periods of time working in Spain, Gran Canaria, Puglia, and Tuscany, known for their particular quality of light. In my artistic process, I need to meet the sunlight, collect it in my eyes, and then find it on canvas.

Your works are abstract compositions. What messages are you trying to convey with your art? 

My works result from a process of gradual purification that leads to the disappearance of every recognizable symbol and subject. Each work is a representation of ideas, images, and signs achieved through liberating gestural brushstrokes that signify a trace of what has gradually disappeared. The bright and impetuous color becomes the subject of the work and occupies the entire canvas surface. The color is the primary vehicle of my spontaneous and reckless inner language. In this transformation of language into color, I play with the viewers' gaze and invite them to have fun within the physical limitations of the work in a constant search for a focal point. For the viewers, the search for focus does not find immediate fulfillment, but instead generates a sense of fascination inherent in art.

Color seems to have a particular meaning for your work, and some colors seem to be recurring, like blue and yellow. Can you tell us more about it? And how do you choose your colors?

The color arrived into my work late, after I had been fascinated with ink for a long time, after years of reading, studying, and breaking down Japanese manga and black-and-white comics. The lack of color allowed me to perceive the essence of color itself. In the absence-presence paradox, the non-color transmitted its existence to me, and I immersed myself in the study of color. I connected color to emotions and began to recognize emotions as palpable entities endowed with body and tone. Encountering the yellow and taking possession of it was a moment of self-affirmation, of recognition of my artistic identity. My yellow sings, jumps, and plays with the observer's gaze. For me, yellow is the color of salvation, hope, and joy. Blue is the color for reflection, and I use it to synthesize action. For example, I am currently working on a series of blue paintings in which I abstract figures in motion, such as wrestlers, galloping horses, and riders.

Where do you find inspiration for your work?

I draw inspiration from continuous research, thoughts, experiences, and from various points of view. I observe and think, study and reflect, study and forget, and in the forgetting, I arrive at abstracting and synthesizing. I seek to share a sense of happiness and joy with the viewers by playing and communicating with them through my work.

What are you working on now, do you have any new series or projects you are developing at the moment? Anything exciting you can tell us about?

Currently, I am working on a series of works on paper that focus on primary colors. I am using blue to abstract movements, red to synthesize memories, and yellow to tell stories inspired by traditional songs of southern Italy. To realize this series, in October, I went to Puglia to experience the beautiful light of this region and to immerse myself in Apulian music. 
In December, I will return to Gran Canaria to complete a complex and exciting job: I am creating a large installation using natural stones on one of the hills in the south of the island. Each stone is colored and placed to form the walls of a room accessed through a portal. This place represents a memory room, a place of childhood, or a secret place for tears, experiences, or a sense of belonging. The installation site is accessible to all and visitors are invited to participate by fixing their memories on stones and by creating personal spaces within the installation.

Have you ever thought about turning to NFTs? What are your thoughts on this subject?

Yes, I heard about non-fungible tokens, thanks to some famous NFTs, "Everydays: the First 5000 days" and the animated gif "Nyan Cat". I am familiar with the NFT creation process, but this process does not resonate with my relationship with art. My nature is contemplative and my process of art creation involves research and physical immersion. Although I use digital media and Adobe Photoshop, I prefer to leave NFT creation to others.

What do you wish to accomplish this year, both in terms of career goals and personal life? 

In 2022 I established my studio in Forte dei Marmi, a town in Versilia near Lucca, Pietrasanta, and Carrara. This strip of land, lying between the sea and the Apuan Alps, welcomed many art and cultural personalities after the First World War. In Piazza Garibaldi, in the shade of the plane trees, gathered poets, writers, and painters, including Carrà, Montale, Ungaretti, and Pratolini. The cultural circle born from these meetings was called Quarto Platano, whose name referred to the meeting point located under the fourth plane tree in the row. Even today, this town is a crossroads of art and commerce, and I find it the ideal place to work and to find inspiration. Also in Forte dei Marmi this year, I had the honor of participating with three works in the sixtieth anniversary of Marguttiana Arte, an event sponsored by the municipality of Forte dei Marmi and by the Ugo Guidi Museum, which was founded in 1962 by Walter Lazzaro, Carlo Carrà, Ugo Guidi, Funi, Ordavo, and Pieraccini.

Do you have any upcoming exhibition, event or publication? Where can our readers see your work next? 

In November 2022, one of my works will be presented at the collective exhibition at the FMArt Studio Gallery in Monza. During the same period, I will be traveling to Thailand to draw inspiration both from traditional Thai art and from regional influences on this Southeast Asian country. 
If some of you are traveling to Italy, in Ostuni, Puglia, you will find some of my works exhibited at the contemporary art gallery La Bottega Dell'Angelo.
For the year 2022, you will find my work included in the catalog of Marguttiana Arte in Forte dei Marmi and in the catalog of FMArt Studio in Monza. To contact me and to stay updated, visit my website maristellarana.com and find me on Instagram @maristellarana.