Nicolas Africano's sculptures hearken back in atmosphere to times gone by, and by association of materials and pose to classical sculpture. The subject of his figures for the past several years has been his wife and muse, Rebecca. He paints her and sculpts her is different positions, different ma... Read more
Nicolas Africano’s sculptures hearken back in atmosphere to times gone by, and by association of materials and pose to classical sculpture. The subject of his figures for the past several years has been his wife and muse, Rebecca. He paints her and sculpts her is different positions, different materials, in different states of dress and undress. In this sculpture entitled Reveries she is in a state of private reflection. The position of her hands on her breasts bearsno sensual connotation. She is closed within her being in thought. The figure of cast glass is wearing a long classic simple dress painted the palest shade of beige-pink in glass paint. She sways gently to one side. A one of a kind sculpture, she is a symbol of beauty, purity, dream-like thought. Africano is not afraid of beauty in its most sincere form, nor does he shy away from the human figure as a vehicle to express purity and timelessness. In talking about his work with Lisa Lyons, a long familiar aficionado, the artist used the following words about his work: “humility, indulgence, costume, gender/role, identity (will), nude, naked, bloodless, carnal, place (scene, context), passionate, stoic (ecstatic, static), erotic-unintentional-chaste, absence of irony, egoism, egoless (fourth person), disillusionment, charm, meaning, observation.” In the ‘70s Africano fast became known for his large-scale paintings with tiny figures in wax relief set against a background of uniform color. The figures were enacting scenarios from the artist’s life in pared down visual language. He was then inspired by narratives from the world of dance, primarily the issue of struggle for self revelation as in the series related to Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde as well as Petrouchka. In the 80’s he moved into merging inspiration from his readings of poets, such as Baudelaire and Rimbaud with his own writings, stories that became “his own.”
He works in oil as comfortably as he does in glass. His glass is created by using the lost wax technique after he sculpts a model in wax of the form he brings it to life in his hands. Nicolas Africano was born in Kankakee, Illinois in 1948. Since the 1960’s he has lived and worked in Normal, Illinois
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