Pierre Antoniucci's Kaleidoscopic Painting Explored in Artpress Archive

Galerie Oniris in Rennes, celebrating its 35th anniversary in 2021 and 10 years under director Florent Paumelle in 2022, is featured in a series with artpress. The second installment republishes Xavier Girard's December 1983 article on Pierre Antoniucci (born 1943), a historic artist of the gallery. Antoniucci recently exhibited in Rennes, blending old themes with new approaches. The article describes his painting as a kaleidoscopic fairyland, luxuriant and sensual, with a counterpoint of worn, matte tones evoking ancient frescoes and war omens. Around 1977, Antoniucci began using citations from Roman painting, Greek statuary, and neoclassical Picasso, floating on orange backgrounds, later obscured by foliage like camouflage. He experimented with glass machines to break the surface, leading to his 'Ateliers circulaires'—circular studios viewed from above, with a central void and radiating light, compared to billiard trajectories and Islamic geometries. Subsequent paper cutouts, fragmentary and scattered, intensify the play of perspectives, recently introducing horsemen from old citations, with a grain like thick walls and browns dispelling summer iridescences, shifting from faded luxury to war in painting.