Painter Moreno Biasi creates portraits using various techniques: charcoal, pastel, oil pastel, ink, and acrylic; generally on canvas. For him, “portrait” means “human body”, “figure,” not just “face.”
The portraits are based on photographs, which he generally takes himself, to capture those moments when the subject isn’t expecting to be photographed and reveals their true essence—their most intimate, unposed self, and perhaps even their most fragile and playful side.
“The first thing I do is a charcoal or pencil sketch; then, looking at the sketch, I think about the subject, and suddenly my eye stops merely looking, but begins to see colors moving and dancing with the subject, and certain colors become more significant than others, emerging as the dominant ones.
Every person has their own colors, and being able to see them dance helps me realize that there’s a connection between me and the subject—and those are the right colors with which to create the portrait.
It can take minutes, hours, or days for this to happen, but when it does, it’s the sign that the work has been conceived; it’s just a matter of completing the form and color.
Once my mind and heart are in agreement, I begin; I completely erase the sketch, but a small trace always remains marked on the canvas—like that person’s DNA—and this makes me smile because I think of my limitations, of human limitations: the true work of art has already been drawn and conceived by someone else far more of an Artist than I am!
I only copy—I do not create!
I would like, however, to draw closer to that Creator; that’s why the eyes are the first thing I paint—eyes that are the soul of that person. And until they “speak” to me, until I see that they express a certain light, I try and try again! The rest comes almost on its own,” says Biasi.
It’s a very demanding, painstaking process, requiring great attention to detail—gentle strokes that are like caresses (even though he doesn’t use brushes)—and which gradually establish an emotional connection between him and the subject of the painting.
Once finished, he applies a coat of protective varnish and the work is complete; then it can be delivered… with a farewell, just as one would to a friend and/or a loved one whom one is unlikely to see again but whom one has nonetheless come to know.”
