Lignee News & Down ◄◄◄◄◄
the
Primitive and Magical World
of Ernesto Caiazza
Italy has many Artists but
there are not many who are abJe to make an outstanding pro-fessional
name for themselves in thè world of art. Self-aught, is Ernesto Caiazza,
a sculp-ture of eminent fame. He was born in 195J in Vairano Patenora in
thè province of Caserta and Jives an works in Arese, a small town in thè
hinterland of Milan. Ernesto Caiazza's artistic vocation emerged in 1973
in Great Britain (city of St. Albans) where he visited thè various
London museums with a preponderance of Ancient and Primitive art,
especially thè Bri
tish
Museum. He thought about and studied thè art of Black Africa; fascinated
by thè works of thè Baluba and Basonge tribes he remained for
interminable hours admiring those ambiguous and mysterious faces and
attempted to unfathom thè magical and fantastic secrets that they
concealed. Bewitched and charged with culture, sculptural inspiration
sprang in thè Artist, indeed he started to carve and sculpt tree trunks
and bark making them into human forms.
Later in 1975 he returned to his native country and settled in Milan
with his family. Spurred on by positive criticisms he took part in
National and International Competitions, exhibiting his sculptures in
various Lombard galleries and receiving acclaim and wide recognition.
The Artist was praised and applauded by thè critics and thè art-loving
public.
His works have undoubted coherence, of whose reality they are a
significant reflection. Caiazza's spiritual breadth appears in every
figure where one can perceive thè suffering inflicted on thè human race,
above ali thè humiliations undergone by thè people of thè Third World,
trampled on and despised. The evolution of his art over time can be seen
in thè different materials used (wood/hard stone, tale crystal, granite,
minerals and brass). He is continuously searching for new materials on
which he can imprint thè human essence of thè empirical space in which
he lives.
Succeeding with mastery he has realised thè dream of seeing one of his
works ("Kore" 3 m. h.) displayed in thè "Pagani Foundation" Museum of
Modern Art located in thè city of Castellanza (Varese).
He has à vast curriculum and his sculptures form part of various
International and National collections. Only Lilia Lo Savio (thè writer)
has been able to enter thè secret refuge and be present during thè
creative stage of thè "Prophet", a work made from a block of granite
weighing 25 q.li . The mystical carving of thè sculptures partially
explains thè artist's potential. Humble and gifted with extreme
sensitivity, Ernesto Caiazza is an honour to his native country, his
produetion is formidable, it will certainly be an indelible record of
our era.
Giusy Ursillo
Biografhy and artistic personality
Ernesto Caiazza was born in Vairano Patenora, in
thè province of Caserta, on July 24th 1951. He now lives and works in
via A. Granisci, 49, Arese, province of Milan. As he in self-taught, we
can consider his woden, stone and chalk crystal figures pure projec-tion
of IS inner self,messages that try to explain certain difficult problems,and
to stimulate our minds. 
They are not conventional, or artificially savage figures, but thè
expression of his ability to concentrate and to develop a theme,
following in thè foot steps of Third World sculpture. His sculpture IS
intense and drammatic, denoucing man's petty ways and his errors,the
anxieties and changes in time relationship to Italian society. Antonino
De Bono has written an appraisal of thè artist which IS a great help in
understan-ding thè human and social content of thè artist's work, thè
development of his awareness of art,and his search for meanings.
"Ernesto Caiazza developed above ali in Great Britain, were he spent
considerable time. He loved to visit antique shop, buyng Nineteenth
century Water Colour Society. But his favou-rite-e pass time was
browsing in museums, particularly thè British museum;were you can find
nearly everything. He began to be fascinated by thè primitive art of
Africa, and he would spend hours in front of thè compositions of thè
"baluba" and "basonge". He looked for books which could explain thè
mystery of these ambiguous faces, thè fascination of thè masks, and thè
secret of concentric circles and tattoos, until Caiazza realised t
hat
he was beginning to penetrate-e thè hidden corners of thè "fang" of
Gabon, and thè way thè "bayaka" and "bapende" used paints on fetishes,
and to anderstand thè religious importance attributed to thè statues
which atood in an empirical, metaphysical, magical, unreal space.
Ernesto Caiazza began to carve tree trucks, digging human features out
of thè bark. He soon realised that he was setting in motion primitive
beings which could turn against him...
Wile he was visiting thè Museum of Man in Paris, Ernesto Caiazza was
truck by thè monumentai stones of Easter Island, thè Marquises Islands,
and southern Polynesia. Instead of trying to bring out thè mythical
spirit of our ancestors,and thè subtle essence of nature, he thought
that he was developing a popular form of art, emphasizing thè collective
spirit of populations. And so he produced his taH"Slave"sculptures, in
wood, thè stylized representa-tion of his symbolic concept of thè
matyrdom of thè downtrodden, abused working classes; "thè Pharaoh", a
wooden figure which sums up thè lustful habits of certain important
figures of thè regime; and "The Rebel", expressed with great plastic
force, ta convey thè grote-sque, surreal image of thè apostle of
revolution who projects himself barricade. His works are archaic
sculptures of unusual attraction, thè warmth of wood, strongly stylized
and armed with a dramatic inner force.
In their expressionistic effects and straightforward naturalistic
inspiration, they convey a par-ticular pathos, expressed with simplicity
in thè synthetic form, as if to point out to thè tribes of white men
populating Europe, thè meaning of popular form of art that has its roots
in prehi story.
His thoughts on life. "Life IS a gift whose importance we should ali
understand, and each
living being should respect thè life of others as if it were his own.
Unfortunated our corrupt age only sees thè importance of money, and of
ali that it can offer".
By "Italian Art In The World"
Antonio Oberti