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Franco Fontana
PHOTOGRAPHER
b1933 Italy
ABOUT
Franco Fontana was born in 1933 in Modena. He took up photography in 1961 and joined an amateur club. Color photography, from the late 1960s, finds in Franco Fontana one of its most emblematic representatives. His first solo exhibition in 1968 in Modena showcased the artist's early studies on color, space, form, and light. His most famous series, Landscapes, first appeared in 1970 at the Palazzo dei Diamanti in Ferrara. In these works, chromatic sensitivity and the ability to reveal hidden geometries in nature merge into a sublime visual synthesis. Fontana isolates the essential elements of the natural scenery, which change with light and seasons, sustaining the harmony of the composition. This abstract analysis led to comparisons with painters like Tobey, Rothko, and Poliakoff. In the late 1970s, a trip to the United States exposed Fontana to urban environments vastly different from his experience. Despite apparent chaos, he continued to isolate significant elements from visual stimuli. His Urban Landscape works depict cities devoid of human presence, with predominant chromatic and geometric themes. With the series Presence Absence (late 1970s to early 1980s), Fontana suggests human presence as an immaterial and unsettling shadow that interacts with architectural elements, reversing perspectives. These shadows, more eloquent than our physical presence, symbolize the unconscious and evoke Italian metaphysical painting (De Chirico, Savinio, etc.). In his explorations of American cities, Fontana often portrays individuals accompanied by their shadows, emphasizing the unfathomable mystery of our nature. His work Caught in American Light (2001) pays homage to Edward Hopper's painterly atmospheres and the solitude of metropolitan life. From 2000 onwards, Fontana continued his exploration of signs and fragments typical of urban pavements, creating works like Asphalts. He participated in workshops and conferences worldwide and curated advertising campaigns for brands such as Fat, Volvo, Volkswagen, Sony, Versace, Canon, and Kodak.
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