To coincide with the first exhibition in France and with the gallery, I am pleased to share my conversation with Italian painter, Giulio Noccesi.
The particularity of the artist's work is that Noccesi conceives a whole network of scenes that are, at first glance, independent but are in fact closely linked. Moreover, the artist achieves to create a dialogue between the pictorial genres: figure, landscape and still life interact within each work. With a great freedom, Giulio Noccesi follows first what he wants to convey and the painting only follows this rule. Layer by layer, painting by painting, the artist unfolds his artistic world to form a whole: a fresco that reflects both his personal perspective on the History of Italian art, his own history, and the way in which he can inscribe his personal life into this heritage through his art.
The particularity of the artist's work is that Noccesi conceives a whole network of scenes that are, at first glance, independent but are in fact closely linked. Moreover, the artist achieves to create a dialogue between the pictorial genres: figure, landscape and still life interact within each work. With a great freedom, Giulio Noccesi follows first what he wants to convey and the painting only follows this rule. Layer by layer, painting by painting, the artist unfolds his artistic world to form a whole: a fresco that reflects both his personal perspective on the History of Italian art, his own history, and the way in which he can inscribe his personal life into this heritage through his art.
Born in 1996 in Florence, Giulio Noccesi is a painter based in Turin. Graduated in 2018 from the Accademia di Belle Arti di Firenze, the artist presented his work in group exhibitions in Italy and abroad. And the recent exhibition titled "Fermo per sempre (Stranded in time)" at New York Life gallery marks the artist solo exhibition debut and in USA.
Giulio Noccesi in his studio, Turin, Italy
"I am not interested in creating a coherent world through the paintings. I’m more interested in finding out how an image and a narrative can be fragmented."
Giulio Noccesi
Elsa Meunier - Can you introduce yourself? (Short bio, career path, what determined your choice to devote yourself to your artistic practice).
Giulio Noccesi - My name is Giulio Noccesi, I am 29 years old and I live in Turin, Italy. I was born in 1996 in Florence. I studied printmaking at Florence Fine Art Academy, graduating in 2019. In September 2023, I moved to Turin where I live and have a studio. I always created images since I was a child. As a kid, I was a fantasy nerd and I wanted to draw illustrations of dragons and such. My parents used to take me to museums and churches, I always have been fascinated by paintings, especially the ones from early Renaissance like by Benozzo Gozzoli in ''La Cappella dei Magi'', by Masaccio and Masolino's in the ''Cappella Brancacci''. I always painted and drew since high-school and never stopped. I won the Hernion Award by Hampstead Art Society in 2023 and, with the money, I moved to Turin. Right now, I am sharing a studio with Luca Ceccherini, Maddalena Pamio and Leonardo Devito, painters I highly respect.
E.M - Your work combines several pictorial genres within a single piece. It is not uncommon to find a different genre on each ground. For example, the work presented at the exhibition titled ‘Three Apples’ we can see in the foreground, three apples; in the middle ground, an enigmatic face truncated by the apples in front; and in the background, a landscape. In a larger work ‘Leo e Elisa’ we can also see a couple, then a still life on a stool and in the background a landscape seen through the window. This often leads to your paintings being interpreted in layer by layer. Is this a way for you to invite the viewer to look closely at your painting and immerse themselves in it?
G.N - I like to create images within images. I think that the ''real world' is like this. Nothing is isolated by itself, everything is ''contaminated'' by something. I like to create little worlds inside bigger ones. I also think that is beautiful when a painting, which is a medium based on space, can have an effect on time. Like stretching it or making it stop for the viewer. Being able to discover the different layers of a painting gives me that feeling as a viewer.
E.M - You seems also very interested in the depiction of space, as well as in the interplay between domestic space and exterior spaces – often landscapes or the city. I am thinking to the following works ‘waiting for the third’ ‘alone little chair’, ‘still life with city landscape’. Either a portrait or a still life are in the foreground, this kind of representation reminds us the official portraits from the Italian renaissance where one was portrayed in front of a landscape bellow and far away. Is a way for you to place your work in this heritage ?
G.N - It comes very natural to me to relate to Italian Renaissance Masters. I think they're part of my culture and visual language since I can remember. It's interesting for me to use what they created to tell something about my present life. Since I found this kind of inheritance so deep inside my work, it is fun to try to create a dialogue with it. And if that isn’t the case, it’s simply to refer to something great, whilst trying to stand on the shoulders of giants.
Giulio Noccesi, Aspettando il terzo (Waiting for the third), 2026, oil on canvas, 150x100 cm
Giulio Noccesi, Natura morta con paesaggio di città (Still life with city landscape), 2026, oil on canvas, 110x100cm
E.M - What strikes me about your work is the particularly free interplay of scale and perspective. They seem to respond solely to the needs of the painting and its subject, rather than a direct link to realism. For example, several works feature still life on ‘upside-down’ tables, offering the viewer a complete view of the objects displayed. I’m thinking of the works entitled ‘Strawberries’, ‘Still Life with Fishes’ or ‘Three Apples’. Can you tell us about this approach?
G.N - That’s something that comes very natural to me. When I paint, I like to create something that fits all together, like a puzzle. I don't think myself as a painter of ''subjects'' but more as a painter of interactions between subjects. All the elements of a painting come from different worlds : some of them are from pictures, some of them were born from sketches, some of them come from imagination and so on. It's exciting to make them fit together and play with them like with instruments for an orchestra, to adjust them. You have to ''force'' them into place and painting offers the freedom to do so.
E.M - This approach is not unique to still life. Figures are also highlighted and are often depicted in extreme close-ups of their faces, which frequently appear immense against the landscapes depicted bellow and far away. I’m thinking of 'Ulisse watching birds' or 'Girl picking Flowers'. Could you tell us about these characters and their depiction?
G.N - I like to depict people in a perspective in which they look distorted. I am thinking to that when I am painting a portrait of someone who is looking at me directly. You’re triggering something in the viewer brain. We empathize with the people in the painting and recognize them as human. When you paint someone with this kind of distortion, it's almost like depicting a still life of a human rather than a person itself. And this touches some very hidden and intimate parts of our mind, parts that are hidden. When you look at strangers you see them like traditional portraits but when you look at your loved ones, it is often in some sort of close interaction. Figures get distorted and they become shapes. They become an object. I'm very fascinated by this because I feel that it's something very important for us humans. It is something that we look for in our intimacy, making another one as an object of love, of pleasure, of desire, and making ourselves into one as well. It's also something that we fear, isn't the death the transition from a living being into an object?
Giulio Noccesi, Natura morta con pesci (Still life with fishes) 2026, oil on canvas, 28x25cm
Giulio Noccesi, Ragazza che coglie i fiori (Girl picking up flowers), 2024, oil on canvas, 25x25cm
E.M - I also notice that they are sometimes motifs that display a great freedom and give free rein to the imagination in the scenes depicted like they are from dreams. We can encounter apricots flying around in the work ‘Renault Scenic’, a tiny castle floating next to a fruit basket (‘still life, castle’, or a car that appears to be falling in *Waiting for the Train*. Could you say a few words about these compositions?
G.N - I don't paint those elements for just one reason. Sometimes I feel that they fit the composition, sometime they can symbolize what's on a subject mind like an intrusive thought. I like to have the freedom to do those kind of stuff in my work. I am not interested in creating a coherent world through the paintings. I’m more interested in finding out how an image and a narrative can be fragmented. When something important is happening a lot of other important things are happening too. Everything happens all at once like dreams, backgrounds, intrusive thoughts or for exemple an epic war between ant colonies could happen under the floor tiles of the church while a funeral is taking place.
E.M - Can you describe your usual artistic process for creating your paintings? Do you make sketches or preparatory works, or do you paint directly onto the canvas?
G.N - I have a collection of images. I have books, photographs bought at flea markets, I take pictures with my phone and print them. I sketch everyday on a sketchbook. From these different practices, ideas emerge and take form. When I feel that I find something interesting, I like to draw some sketches. I do this with a black pen on a sketchbook. Sometimes, I do some color studies, paint a small painting with oil color on the sketchbook. I work on primed canvas painted in black with oil paint. At first, I follow my sketch to see if the idea can work. Usually after this stage, I work on them more, adding elements or changing them, changing colors and so on. I feel, that at some point, the painting is there with its values and flows. If it's good, I keep it and if it's not good, I start over an other one.
E.M - What are your main artistic influences on your work in general? And which artist do you most enjoy looking now?
G.N - I love painters from early Renaissance and International Gothic : Piero Della Francesca, Giotto, Hans Memling. Other favourites are Maurice Denis, Gustave van de Woyestine, Betty Swanwick, Pamela Crook. I really like children books, especially the ones by Maurice Sendak, Alan Aldridge and Etienne Delessert. Lately, I really got into Jan Brueghel. I recently visited The Galleria Doria Pamphilji in Rome and I loved his four paintings about the elements. Another huge inspiration for me is my studio pals, Maddalena Pamio, Luca Ceccherini and Leonardo Devito, whose work I see evolving everyday and gives me motivation to evolve mine as well.
Giulio Noccesi, Seggiolina sola (Alone little chair), 2024, oil on canvas, 25x25 cm
