ROBERTO DEMARCHI: Author biography - Painting ideas


Author biography
Roberto Demarchi was born on 15 March 1951 in Turin, where he received a humanities-based high school education before going on to study architecture.
His artistic development began when he was relatively young, and was refined, from 1966
onwards, under the tutelage of the painter from Turin, Riccardo Chicco. His first exhibition was held in 1969 at the Cassiopea gallery in Turin, presented by Angelo Dragone.
Demarchi lectured on history of art while also working as an architect, conducting over the
years a careful, in-depth study of philosophy, literature and music. He has also been an in-
demand conference speaker, focusing above all on history of art.
In Turin in 1990, he held the exhibition Alogia, a journey through the darkness of consciousness and memory, which marked the shift from a figurative language, already attentive to the expressive potential of unusual materials and techniques, to abstraction.
In March 2001, his cycle Perì Physeos was given its definitive form. Deploying a binary pictorial language rigorously reduced to the use of squares and rectangles, it reflected on the auroral moment of Western thought, and in particular on that of the pre-Socratic philosophers. A major monograph on this work was published by Crocetti Editore and presented in 2003 at the Campidoglio in Rome and at Palazzo Bricherasio in Turin.
Contributors to the book included some of the leading names in European poetry, literature and philosophy, such as Zanzotto, Bonnefoys, Kunert, Raboni, Patrikios and Severino.
Since then, besides meditating more deeply on pre-Socratic thought, the painter’s work has been targeted above all on the oeuvre of the tragic poet Aeschylus and on the interpretation and representation of sacred themes taken from the Old and New Testaments.
In 2007, the Genesi exhibition was installd at the Turin State Archive. It was curated by Antonio Paolucci (former Director of the Uffizi and current Director of the Vatican Museum), who would also go on to curate, in 2008 and 2009, the exhibition Genesi del Mondo e Genesi dell’Arte in the Church of Santa Maria del Popolo in Rome.
In April 2011, Claudio Strinati presented, at the Pinacoteca Ambrosiana in Milan, the triptych La passione secondo Matteo, an abstract contemplation of the St Matthew Passion by J.S.Bach, and in September of the same year the painter exhibited, at the Palazzo delle Stelline (also in Milan), the cycle Storia di un quadrato giallo, five large paintings on wood reflecting upon the existential journey of mankind.
In December 2011, Rome’s City Council hosted the exhibition Vangeli Astratti (with a catalogue published by Skira), again curated by Claudio Strinati, composed of twelve large-scale abstract interpretations of twelve episodes narrated in the Gospels. The exhibition was held again, in March 2012, at the Museum of the Holy Shroud in the Church of the Santissimo Sudario in Turin.
In November 2013, through Allemandi publishers, he issued the volume La Tempesta, which offered an innovative iconological reading of The Tempest, the well-known painting by Giorgione, accompanied by Demarchi’s own abstract painterly interpretation.
On 13 June 2014, the Haiku exhibition was inaugurated at the Italian Cultural Institute/
Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Tokyo. It featured seventeen abstract paintings representing
seventeen Japanese poems. Both the exhibition and the catalogue (published by Allemandi) were curated/edited by Antonio Paolucci.
Of particular significance was the Antologia Astratta exhibition in 2015 in Turin, which showcased twenty-five paintings for twenty-five poets, from Alcmane to Zanzotto. From 10 March to 10 July 2016, the Museo d’Arte Orientale Edoardo Chiossone in Genoa will host the Haiku exhibition, previously shown in 2014 in Tokyo.
The Bottari Lattes Foundation displays, from July 9th through September 17th 2016, a triple exhibition entitled “Forma, Materia e Spirito” (Form, Matter and Spirit) in Palazzo Tovegni in Murazzano, in Don Chisciotte space in Turin and in the main location of Monforte.
On May 27th 2017, in the Palazzo Carignano in Turin, the seven tables of the “Genesi” cycle are presented. They were previously displayed in 2007 at the State Archives and the exhibition was curated by Antonio Paolucci.




© Roberto Demarchi 2017 | Versione Italiana

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