Massimo Giannoni

(1954, Empoli, Italy)

​Massimo Giannoni was born in Empoli in 1954. He lives and works in Florence.

He attends the Fine Arts Academy in Florence, where in 1979 he is awarded the Lubiam Prize (Mantua), with Hans Hartung as tutor of the ceremony, a prize that is given to the best student from all the Fine Arts Academies in Italy.

After his first two solo exhibitions held at Vivita Gallery in Florence (1985, 1987), he moves to Sydney, Australia, where he creates a series of portraits on commission, and works on large abstract paintings, using watercolour on paper laid on canvas. He continues to exhibit, and in 1989, he has a solo show at Brown Street Gallery, Sydney.

Before returning permanently to Italy, he moves to the United States. He continues to receive commissions of portraits and works on his large abstract paintings, which he exhibits at Thomas Monahan Fine Arts, Chicago (1996, 1997).

Once back in Italy, he begins to paint with oils, experimenting with a very material technique, made of thick layers of colour with which he manages to create images that are perceived in an informal abstract way at close range, but that take on a realistic and more defined form as one moves away from the painting. The material thus acquires a life of its own and, by separating itself without being only a description, becomes a subject within a subject.

His favourite themes are libraries and bookstores, where the overlapping of stacked volumes, with the ribs of the books inside the shelves, hint at stories already read, and others yet to be read. The viewer is projected into his own experience. The interiors of Stock Exchanges are another recurrent theme, lit by almost psychedelic LED light, they are far from the static and accumulated reality of bookstores. Other fascinating subjects are the half-empty abandoned rooms, where an armchair or a few books on the floor suggest a previous presence of man. As are also, the ancient palaces of the Florentine nobility, such as the great Palazzo Serristori or the plaster casts galleries and the large rooms of a museum.

Since the late 1990s, Giannoni has exhibited in countless solo and group exhibitions in galleries worldwide, and has taken part in major international art fairs. He has been included in numerous museum shows, such as Fuori tema/Italian feeling, XIV Quadriennale di Roma, Palazzo delle Esposizioni, Rome (2005); Il Paesaggio Italiano Contemporaneo, Palazzo Ducale, Gubbio (2005); 1968-2007, Arte Italiana, curated by Vittorio Sgarbi, Palazzo Reale, Milan (2007).  In 2011, he participates in 54th International Art Exhibition Biennale of Venice, and in 2012 he paints the remarkable Muro del Pianto, a large triptych, oil on canvas measuring 200 x 600 cm, created especially for the solo exhibition Four Triptychs, curated by Marco Tonelli, Palazzo delle Esposizioni, Rome. The preliminary study for this incredible undertaking is exhibited at the Jewish Museum in Bologna in 2016. In 2019, during the celebrations for the anniversary of the Italian Republic, Giannoni inaugurates a solo exhibition at the United Nations Building in Geneva, and in 2020, as part of Quirinale Contemporaneo, Giannoni’s two canvases become part of the permanent collection of Palazzo del Quirinale, Rome.