Time is the cozy, domestic environment of well-known hometown pathways, an emotional frontier that reality makes the authentic inside of us. Space is knowledge and introspection of surrounding phenomena. Flavia Rebori’s aesthetic research was born here, at the start of her studies at the Pontifical Catholic University of Santiago.
“I started in the Eighties with oil painting and drawing, she says, but it is with watercolors that I found my pathway. In the beginning, I needed to improve my technique. I was lucky to meet the artist and great master Lea Kleiner, an emancipated woman who taught my colleagues and me how to address gender stereotypes in art.”
The artist’s recurrent subjects are familiar and everyday elements of life. “It has not been easy to break free of my background, but I realized that drawing and painting were at odds. In watercolor, I found my freedom. In the beginning, I reproduced a tree repeatedly; I needed to see it, feel it, touch it, and figure out the changes along the seasons to internalize it and make it mine. It was one of my first series”.
Contemplation, therefore, becomes necessary to identify and reconstruct intimately the reflection of everything surrounding us. “Subject is an excuse to bring forward what you need to say. In everyday life, I search for my poetics by looking at what has repeatedly attracted me over time, always finding new aspects.
Among the subjects chosen, there are also several urban views. “Fifteen years ago, I went to Venice to find Turner’s fogs, but the result was not what I had expected. So, I started to work on a series of travel sketches to paint in solitude and find myself. Venice had another surprise for me, though. By chance, I found an old shop selling handmade paper, which seemed perfect for my technique: working the paper when it is still wet. I bought a big leather-bind book; the owner revealed that her shop dated back to the Seventeenth century and would supply from an ancient paper mill in Amalfi trat used an old production technique. I still buy that paper which reacts differently to the other papers and is perfect for my works.”
Flavia Rebori will be showing her artworks together with other five watercolors artists at the exhibition “The glaciers seen from the watercolor”, curated by Macaelina Campos, founder of Fundaction Casa Museo de la acuarela, in Santiago de Chile from 1st to 21st of October 2022 at “L’escalier espace d’art” (Montreuil, Paris, France). From 24th May, the Cultural Centre of the Italian School of Santiago De Chile will host the solo exhibition “Valparaiso” devoted to the Chilean city. The exhibition is curated by Gabriela Castillo; the catalogue has a contribution by Ernesto Muñoz.
