Begins his artistic career in the early 1950’s.
He organizes his first personal art exhibition in 1967 in the prestigious Maschio Angioino castle in Naples, Italy.
Throughout the years he has been exhibiting with success in Italy and abroad.
Important artistic events have been held in New York, San Francisco and Caracas.
He currently has a permanent exhibition of some of the most significant works of his career in the Museum of the Second Renaissance in Milan.
Of great interest is his artistic research and expression of what the critics defined “the Mediterranean Icon” a unique painting style in which Ferdinando Ambrosino blends profane imagery and dramatic tones of his land with the memory of sacred iconography of Russian art.
Born at Bacoli on 11 May 1938 Ferdinando Ambrosino began painting in the early fifties, and with some success. As early as 1956 he was dividing his time between pursuing his classical studies and his involvement in both organizing art exhibitions and partecipating in them, which in that same year culminated in the staging of a large art exhibition in the public gardens of Bacoli. On this particular occasion, when writing for the Unita' newspaper Paolo Ricci stressed that "young Ferdinando Ambrosino's ambition is far-reaching," and furthermore "he has indubitably adopted the wide canvases of the Italian realists as his models, and is aspiring to trackle wide-ranging themes on a large scale."
In 1957 he received his Classical High School Diploma and the following year he enrolled on the Geological Science Course at the University of Naples, and this interest of his in Geology was to be kept alive for several decades to come. In the meantime his activity as a painter developed, and by the year 1959 had begun to create several large-scale canvases which, colletively, might well be classified under the heading of "cubism". One of these was awarded a prize by a jury of experts in occasion of his partecipation in the "First Edition of the National Exhibition for Young Italian Artists," held in Naples.
After his initial phase there followed the series of large scale "neo-realistic" style canvases, the predominant theme of which is the world of the countryside and labourer characterized by a sense of heaviness and the fatigue of labour.
In 1961 his own individual style began to mature through his various experiences and his continuous visits to the leading Italian museums, while the year closed with his partecipation in the competition for the Avezzano Prize.
In 1962 he took part in a joint exhibition with masters of contemporary art working in Naples, amongst whose number figured Emilio Notte, Carlo Striccoli and Paolo Ricci.
In 1965, following a period of deep reflection, he made a firm decision about his future career as an artist, and gave up his university studies to devote himself entirely, and with a deepening sense of commitment, to his art; and it is from this time onwards that his partecipation in national exhibitions began to increase at an incessant rate. In 1966 he won first prize in the National "Fatigati" Exhibition with a composition of considerable chromatic intensity, and also won first prize in the "Citta' di Ercolano" National Painting Exhibition. It is in this very year that he furthered his interest in themes and subjects of naturalistic character in which his dialogue "with things" and with his native enviroment became even more closely felt and personalized; influences from Impressionism and Cubism appeared even more evident in his work.
In 1967 after some years of serious and thoughtful work, Ferdinando Ambrosino arranged for his first one-man exhibition at the UCAI in the Maschio Angioino in Naples. He met critic and writer Piero Girace who immediately became his enthusiastic fan. In the UCAI showroom -Alfredo Schettini wrote in the Naples newspapers Il Mattino- the personal exhibition of Ferdinando Ambrosino, the painter from Bacoli, is now on show for all to see. In introducing this self-taught artist, Attilio Peduto has singled out the real artistic qualities and features that make up the artist's personality, which has developed in the fabled atmosphere of the Campi Flegrei. Burning landscapes of a dark colour scheme for depicting heroic deeds, brushed on thick layers, at a brisk pace, are seen within his plastic visions of Torregaveta and Punta di Epitaffio, and presented as fairy-tale lands and sleeping landscapes such as dreams are made of in which the overall individuality of the source of inspiration also embraces those technical variations that form part of his poetic fantasy."
In the same year he took part in the "Cerreto Guidi" National Biennial Exhibition of Art where the jury comprising Armando Nocentini, Gastone Breddo and Giuseppe Migneco awarded his work a gold medal. At the National Art Exhibition of the Tourist Office of Desenzano on Garda Lake, he was aknowledged as the best Italian artist to partecipate, when not yet thirty years of age.
In 1968 he accepted the invitation to hold a personal one-man exhibition in Venezuela extended to him by a leading art gallery of Caracas, receveing enormous success from both critics and public alike. Leading specialist reviews and newspapers focused their full attention on this exhibition, and the Venezuelan television network devoted exclusive coverage in a special cultural programme. The "Tiuna Film" Company made a short film that was shown in all the cinema houses throughout Venezuela. In the meantime he took part in the premio Suzzara and obtained first prize in the "Smargassi" National Painting Competition at the same time winning high honours from the President of the Italian Republic at the "Proposta Culturale", a National Exhibition held in Naples. To close the year his presence was felt through several of his canvases at Pescia and at the "Premio delle Arti" in Sulmona.
In 1969 he held two exhibitions of his own works: one at Il Cannocchiale Gallery in Milan where he was presented by Piero Girace, who stressed his gifts as a colour artist and as a true interpreter of the atmosphere of his native soil; the other at the Marconi Gallery in Foggia.
He also took part in the 3rd Bolzano Biennial and the National Exhibition of San Marino.
His work tells the story of the objects of everyday life: it is the narration of emotions and feelings experienced by the daily backcloth of the artist's conscience, the faithful transcription of things and events in the world and in life which the artist comes across in his daily experience. In his paintings he recounts the world's events, life, men's activities, all the things that are nearby and within reach, and everything that surrounds him. It is the triumph of reality, not of an imaginary world, it is the theatre of real life and man's time on earth, not of thoughts and ideas. In these years Ambrosino's paintings reflects the way in which his conscious awareness looks at, perceives, hears and caresses the things that are seen, touched, heard, smelt and experienced. The fabric of life becomes his painting and painting safeguards and protects what the body touches, looks at, hears, seese, experiences and loves. In short, he perceives and responds to the everyday things of our daily lives.
His one-man shows at the Marcos Castillo Gallery of Caracas in Venezuela and Barcaccia of Naples date back to the year 1970, while his presence in certain prestigious national art exhibition is felt ever more frequently, such as the "Mario Sironi" Prize in Naples, and that of the "Citta' di Imperia", of "Riviera del Conero", and that of "Posillipo", again in Naples. "There are many different and varied ways of being an artist. Without feelings and without a heart painting is a sterile occupation. Suffice it to see the paintings that Ferdinando Ambrosino has brought together in that exhibition to convince oneself of the truth of this." These are the words of Ignazio Mormino that preface the introductory text to the personal exhibition that Ambrosino held at Lecco at "Ca'vegia" in 1971, an important exhibition of paintings that opened the rich and prolific year of important engagements.
The art exhibition held in Philadelphia at the "Newmann" Modern Art Gallery, his nomination for the "Vasto" Award, at the Arena d'Oro Gallery in Verona. And in addition the personal exhibition at the Michelangelo Gallery in Bergamo, and at the Marconi Gallery in Foggia. And finally his participation in the "Citta' di Lesa" Prize crown an important year in the long itinerary of exhibitions in which Ferdinando Ambrosino has exposed his works.
In 1972 he was invited to the great international prize of Viareggio and held three personal exhibitions of a certain relevance in Caracas, at the studio 188 in Trani and at La Vernice in Bari.
He appeared once more in Bari in 1973 at the Martello d'Oro Gallery the following year with a personal exhibition, receiving at the same time an invitation to the "Saint Ambrose" National Award for Painting in Milan. The year 1974 opened with an itinerant exhibition througout Greece, Turkey, Rumania and the former Soviet Union with a collection of some fifthy of his more recent works. For this occasion the Italian television service devoted full coverage to the painter and his works that featured at the exhibition.
Following this success Ferdinando Ambrosino was invited to compete for the "Brunellesco" Prize in Florence, and partecipate in the "Arte-Sport" Exhibition in Merano, and in the "Aldebaran" Prize held at Sassuolo. Furthermore, at Waterbury in the USA at the Biennial organized by the Culture Art Centre, and for the third edition of the "Giuseppe Bazzoli" Prize in Milan, at the "Citta' di Soresina" Prize in Cremona, and he also arranged for a one-man exhibition at the Serio Art Centre in Naples.
His constant searching revealed the meaning and presence of man and nature through his painting and subject matter. In his works of this period a certain dramatic force is detected which finds expression in popular epic themes.
In 1975 his presence was strongly felt at Marcos Castillo Gallery in Caracas in Venezuela in which received an enormous ovation from both critics and public, while a subsequent version of the same was held in Naples at the Serio Art Centre. Still in the same year a monograph was published about the artist with special attention devoted to the works produced between the fifteen year period 1960-1975. The volume was edited by the Neapolitan art critic and writer Domenico Rea, who in presenting Ambrosino's work singled out the specific qualities of his painting, all of which were associated with his Neapolitan origins and with great wealth of culture linked thereto.
In 1976 a one-man exhibition at the Carlo Levi Gallery in Milan became a forerunner of what was going to be the turning point and a moment of a sense of anxiety Ambrosino was living through with regard to change in the year 1977, at a time when he had opted to enjoy a moment for reflection.
In fact it was in this year 1977 that he took up the challenge of a new choice of materials, namely ceramics, which offered him very wide scope for plastic expression and an endless variety of procedures that easily lend themselves to his creative inventiveness. Stimulated by the attractions that this activity could offer him, he created a large series of earthenware wall-plates and numerous sculptures, vases, tiles and panels of various dimensions.
In 1978 he organized a personal exhibition at Nola at the Globo Art Centre and in 1979 he took part in the "79" National Award at Eraclea Mare, and in Caracas at the Centro d'Arte Euro-Americano. The year 1980 opened with two one-man exhibitions of a personal nature at the Serio Art Centre in Naples and at Il Modulo Gallery in Salerno, and the following year his works once more appeared at the Centro d'Arte Euro-Americano in Caracas.
In 1982 under the patronage of Campania Region, the Regional Tourist Office of Ischia organized a large exhibition housing the works of the artist's 1972-1982 decade. Held in the prestigious Aragonese Castle of Ischia the exhibition led on to a one-man exhibition at Il Cannocchiale Gallery in Milan.
The year 1983 might well be considered the great turning point that marked a great step forward in the painting and life of Ferdinando Ambrosino. The artist's political commitement for his native town and its artistica and environmental heritage was rewarded by the consensus of the people which was converted into his being elected mayor of Bacoli.
In 1981 he had met the critic and art historian Professor Carmine Benincasa, who was to have a great impact on his artistic life and on the life of territory of the region of Campania. In fact in that very same year Bacoli town-council administration under the prestigious scientific and artistic management of Carmine Benincasa organized the now famous historic exhibition entitled "Sapere-Sapore", an exhibition of fine arts in Italy ranging from 1958 to 1985, staged in the Aragonese Castle in Baia.
In addition to housing the most famous names in Italian contemporary art, this exhibition marked a permanent focal point in the history of painting and sculpture in Southern Italy of the last few decades. In his preface to the catalogue Carmine Benincasa wrote: "The South does not shed tears over its natural catastrophes, nor claims crumbs for its begging bowl nor asks for the charity of compassion nor the welfare usually handed out to parasites. Rather the South excercise its right to social justice by generating cultural events, and creating challenges for public initiatives, but always running the risk of giving less voice to the fact that it has been violently excluded and outcast from the political plan that has been mapped out for the country's life and development as whole, to be able to state more forcefully that culture and art count as social problem, and that the substance on which they work is not only obscene social injustice and the iniquitous capacity of a political programme that adapts itself to its history and its social and cultural tradition, but rather it runs the risk of existing as a plan at all."
In 1984 he arranged for the staging of a personal exhibition at the Serio Art Centre in Naples with a selection of large-scale works created between 1980 and 1984.
The following year may be considered a period of deep reflection but at the same time a decisive year in that it represents a considerable evolution in his constant searchings. A new form of expression matured embodying a wider vision of reality. According to what the critic Franco Farina wrote: "Unlike his previous works we now find more autonomous creativity, higher powered feelings that are enriched by complex operational forms that become modulated with an emphasis on vivacious colour of a purely Mediterranean stam." Still in the year 1986 he held an exhibition of his own works at the Serio Art Centre and under the patronage of the township of Ferrara a splendid anthological review of his art was organized at the Palazzo dei Diamanti. Introduced through the catalogue prepared by Franco Farina, Carmine Benincasa and Gianni Race emphasis is placed on Ferdinando Ambrosino's research into the history of Italian art after the Second World War. "This exhibition -wrote Carmine Benincasa in the catalogue- sums up the adventure of a painter, a life time challenge, and a cultural awareness for interpreting the world. In his painting is the self-revealing world and the progression of things."
In 1987 he held an anthological exhibition at the Serio Art Centre and in 1988 yet another personal exhibition in Venezuela at the Centro d'Arte Euro-Americano in Caracas. The eighties decade closed with high significant anthological-type art review at La Scaletta Gallery in Matera. Until the beginning of the nineties, albeit using a highly personalized form of expression and most courageous colour schemes, and adopting his own original artistic solutions and still poetically autonomous, Ferdinando Ambrosino still belonged to the wide circle of figurative painters.
The great turnabout came in 1989-90 when his painting was eventually liberated and set free. Finally his cry for liberty, his flight from the constrictions of forms and the creations of rainbows that shed a new universe of light and which introduced a new alphabet with no past, the construction of new architetural planning, the violence of his chromatic scale alternated with the changing season of an oriental softness now generated geographical schemes where the main actors that expressed the artist's way of feeling are reds and blacks, symptoms of a newly-acquired wisdom, a new understanding in his painting, from which there is no turning back. These colours of his are the colours of Greek tragedy, and are deliberately chosen. The area in which the artist lived, that of the Campi Flegrei is an area completely steeped in Greek mythology, it is the Magna Graecia of Antiquity. Here the caves of the Cumaen Sybil are to be found whence the prophetic oracle was once delivered.
The landscapes are no longer those of nature, as in the works of his earlier period, but are now landscapes of the mind. The colours that modulate shades and tones are in tune with poet's feelings, which are expressed and revealed by melancholy-pervaded gashes of greys, blacks and ochre-grey rays with woodland shades mirrored in the burning fire below the ashes, and reds that tear open and flame but causing havoc, opaque yellows and violet scattered about like lightweight hope-giving stepping-stones and a heaven beach.
In 1990 under the patronage of the Ministry of the Cultural Heritage, of the Region Lazio, of the Region Campania and of the Comune of Rome, under the artistic guidance of Professor Carmine Benincasa the great exhibition is realized in the monumental complex of San Michele a Ripa in Rome, with works spanning a thirty-year period of Ferdinando Ambrosino's artistic production. For this occasion the volume printed by Spirali was published with text contributed by Carmine Benincasa and Armando Verdiglione. In the same year in the Palazzo degli Alessandri at Viterbo, the Province of Viterbo organized an exhibition with works dating back to the artist's 1980-1990 decade.
In 1991 he organized a personal exhibition at the Ca' d'Oro Gallery in Rome. The year 1992 followed with a large exhibition held at the prestigious Paris Art Centre Art Gallery. For this particular occasion a volume on the artist's work was published with contributions made by Carmine Benincasa, Armando Verdiglione, Fernando Arrabal, Alice Granger, Gabi Glechmann, Roger Dadoun, Dominique Desanti, Toni Brachet, Aleksei Nikolaev, Julius Edlis and Jean-Pierre Faye. In the same year he was invited to exhibit at the Musée du Bastion Saint André in Antibes on the Cote d'Azur.
In 1993 he held two very important one-man exhibitions, one at Caracas at the Centro di Arte Euro-Americano Gallery, and the other in Miami in Florida at the Ambrosino Gallery. In the year that followed, 1994, he organized an exhibition in New York at the Spazio Italia Gallery. In the catalogue written by Letizia Triches and Carmine Benincasa: "This marks a very important step in Ambrosino's artistic career -in the words of Carmine Benincasa- Ambrosino has been working for several years now, one never ending protracted cycle of paintings all dealing with the ICON theme." These paintings represent his own private theological reflections, his own personal revolution that knows nothing of ideological movements nor has any theoretical bases to refer to, but is a refection that regards his own painting. And further:"...the Russian icon is the start of his work. In this work in progress the entire visual and historical experience of the artist and the entire knowledge acquired in the course of training his awereness is boiled down to a vague form. But once the final outcome of the painting has been achieved, the freedom becomes total and unconditional."
1995 is characterized by two one-man exhibitions in two European cities. The first in Geneva at the gallery bookshop La Deuxieme Renaissance, the other in Marbella at El Cataleyo Gallery. In 1996 he set up two one-man exhibitions, one in Ferrara at Il Secondo Rinascimento Gallery, the other in Milan at Il Cannocchiale Gallery, with catalogue contributions by Osvaldo Patani and Vitaliano Corbi. He also took part in Lineart 96 in Ghent, Belgium, and in the autumn of this year he arranged a personal exhibition, on the now predominant theme of icons at the Spazio Italia Gallery in New York.
In 1997 he was invited to exhibit at San Francisco at the Italian Institute of Culture and in the same year exposed his work in Naples at the church of San Francesco delle Monache, the now predominant theme being that of "Icons." In the catalogue for Il Corvo, the texts were compiled by Aniello Montano, Vitaliano Corbi and Ciro Ruju. The projectual force of the painter is expressed with dark lines, outlines of shapes and objects without any true identity, that are held together and disintegrate, generating on the surface of the picture a continous movement, an entangled confusion of strom and life, of passion and faith, of involvement and definitive commitment for the rhythm of life.
In this whirlpool of signs it is still possible to decipher fragments of a reality that has been transformed into the light-bringing rainbow that the artist leaves us behind to enjoy.
Ambrosino has not in fact renounced the reality that remains his starting point; rather he has cut himself loose and has prevented it from becoming iron prison bars, so that in his work the abstract lives alongside the figurative, that is to say his freedom is the expression of his conscience.
His figurative painting of former years has now progressed towards an evocative solution, of suggestions of light in which every form loses its shape, thins out and refers to a somewhre beyond, to "another" universe, towards an immense evocative power of the conscience of imagination.
Ferdinando Ambrosino nasce a Bacoli l'11 maggio del 1938 e già dai primissimi anni cinquanta incomincia a dipingere ottenendo risultati apprezzabili. Ancora nel 1956 alterna gli studi classici alla partecipazione e all'organizzazione di manifestazioni d'arte che proprio in quell'anno culminano in una grande rassegna espositiva nei giardini di Bacoli. E per l'occasione Paolo Ricci sull'“Unità” sottolinea come “Ferdinando Ambrosino, giovanissimo, ha ambizioni più alte”. E ancora: “I suoi modelli sono certo le grandi tele dei realisti italiani e la sua aspirazione è di affrontare temi di largo respiro e di dimensioni notevoli”.
Nel 1957 consegue la maturità classica e l'anno successivo si iscrive ai corsi di scienze geologiche presso l'Università di Napoli, un interesse, questo per la geologia, che manterrà vivo per diversi decenni.
Nel frattempo intensifica la sua attività di pittore e, a partire dal 1959, esegue tele di notevoli dimensioni, che nel loro insieme potrebbero essere classificate come cubiste. Una di queste viene premiata da una qualificata giuria in occasione della sua partecipazione alla prima edizione della rassegna nazionale dei giovani pittori italiani a Napoli.
Dopo questa prima fase, inizia la serie delle grandi tele di stile neorealista il cui tema predominante è quello del mondo rurale e operaio caratterizzato dalla pesantezza e dalla fatica del lavoro.
Nel 1961 matura sempre più un proprio stile attraverso varie esperienze e l'assidua frequentazione dei maggiori musei italiani. Chiude l'anno con la partecipazione al Premio Avezzano.
Nel 1962 partecipa a una collettiva con i maestri dell'arte contemporanea che operano a Napoli, tra cui Emilio Notte, Carlo Striccoli, Paolo Ricci e altri ancora. Dopo un periodo di riflessione, nel 1965, affronta in termini decisivi il suo futuro destino di artista: abbandona gli studi universitari per dedicarsi con impegno sempre crescente alla pittura. E da questo momento in poi le partecipazioni alle mostre nazionali si susseguono sempre più numerose.
Nel 1966 ottiene il primo premio alla mostra nazionale Fatigati con una composizione di notevole intensità cromatica. Vince il primo premio alla mostra nazionale di pittura Città di Ercolano. E proprio in quest'anno inizia ad approfondire il suo interesse per soggetti di carattere naturalistico e paesaggistico in cui il dialogo con le cose e con l'ambiente natale si fa più stretto e personale. Rimangono ancora evidenti gli influssi dell'impressionismo e del cubismo.
Dopo alcuni anni di serio e meditato lavoro, Ferdinando Ambrosino allestisce nel 1967 la sua prima mostra personale presso l'UCAI, nel Maschio Angioino di Napoli. Conosce il critico e scrittore Piero Girace che subito diventa il suo entusiasta sostenitore. “Nei saloni dell'UCAI”, scrive Alfredo Schettini sul “Mattino di Napoli”, “è stata allestita la personale del pittore di Bacoli Ferdinando Ambrosino. Nel presentare questo artista autodidatta, Attilio Peduto individua le componenti genuine della sua personalità, sviluppatasi nell'atmosfera favolosa dei Campi Flegrei. Paesaggi ardenti di un cupo eroismo cromatico, a strati corposi e a ritmo serrato, nelle plastiche visioni di Torregaveta e di Punta Epitaffio , cui fanno riscontro Fiaba e alcuni tranquilli paesaggi di sogno, nei quali l'unicità del motivo ispiratore non esclude le variazioni tecniche aderenti alla poetica fantasia”.
Nello stesso anno partecipa alla biennale nazionale di pittura Cerreto Guidi dove la giuria composta da Armando Nocentini, Gastone Breddo e Giuseppe Migneco premia la sua opera con una medaglia d'oro. Alla mostra nazionale dell'Azienda autonoma del turismo di Desenzano del Garda, non ancora trentenne, viene riconosciuto come migliore artista italiano partecipante.
Nel 1968 viene invitato nel Venezuela da un'importante galleria di Caracas per una personale. Ottiene un grande successo di critica e di pubblico. Riviste specializzate e quotidiani s'interessano ampiamente alla mostra. La televisione venezuelana gli dedica un servizio esclusivo in un programma culturale. La Tiuna Film realizza un cortometraggio proiettato in tutte le sale cinematografiche del Venezuela.
Nel frattempo partecipa al Premio Suzzara, ottiene il primo premio al concorso nazionale di pittura Smargiassi e vince l'alta onorificenza del Presidente della Repubblica alla mostra nazionale Proposta culturale di Napoli. E infine è presente con alcune tele a Pescia e al Premio delle Arti di Sulmona.
Nel 1969 tiene ancora due personali: una alla galleria Il Cannocchiale di Milano dove è presentato da Piero Girace che ne sottolinea le doti di colorista e di interprete reale dell'atmosfera delle sue terre; l'altra alla galleria Marconi di Foggia.
Partecipa anche alla terza biennale di Bolzano e alla mostra nazionale di San Marino.
La sua opera è il racconto delle cose di ogni giorno, la narrazione di emozioni e vibrazioni provocate dal tessuto quotidiano nella coscienza di un artista, la trascrizione fedele di cose ed eventi in cui l'artista s'imbatte nel corso della sua esperienza quotidiana. Nella pittura egli racconta le cose del mondo, la vita, i gesti degli uomini, le cose vicine e prossime, ciò che lo circonda. È il trionfo della realtà, non dei phantasmata , è il teatro della vita e del tempo dell'uomo, non dei pensieri e delle idee. In questi anni, la pittura di Ambrosino è il modo in cui la sua coscienza guarda, percepisce, ascolta e accarezza le cose vedute, toccate, udite, odorate, vissute. Il tessuto della vita si fa pittura e la pittura custodisce e protegge ciò che il corpo tocca, guarda, ascolta, vede, vive e ama. Insomma percepisce e risponde alle cose quotidiane.
Sono del 1970 le personali alla galleria Marcos Castillo di Caracas in Venezuela e alla Barcaccia di Napoli, mentre intensifica la sua presenza in alcune prestigiose rassegne espositive nazionali quali il Premio Mario Sironi a Napoli, e i premi Città di Imperia, Riviera del Conero e Posillipo, di nuovo a Napoli. “C'è modo e modo di essere artisti. Senza il sentimento, senza il cuore, la pittura è un'esercitazione sterile. Basta guardare i quadri che Ferdinando Ambrosino ha riunito in questa mostra per convincersi del contrario”. Queste sono le parole di Ignazio Mormino che aprono il testo introduttivo alla mostra personale che Ambrosino tiene a Lecco presso Ca' Vegia nel 1971, una importante rassegna di dipinti che apre l'anno nuovo, ricco e prolifico di appuntamenti importanti.
L'esposizione di Philadelphia, alla galleria d'arte moderna Newman, la segnalazione al Premio Vasto, alla galleria Arena d'Oro di Verona. E ancora, le personali alla galleria Michelangelo di Bergamo e alla Marconi di Foggia e, infine, la partecipazione al Premio Città di Lesa riempiono un anno importante nel lungo itinerario espositivo di Ferdinando Ambrosino
Nel 1972 viene invitato al Gran Premio Internazionale di Viareggio e tiene tre mostre personali di una certa rilevanza a Caracas, allo Studio 188 di Trani e alla galleria La Vernice di Bari. Ancora a Bari nel 1973 presso la galleria Il Martello d'Oro è presente l'anno successivo con una mostra personale e nello stesso tempo riceve l'invito al Premio nazionale di pittura Sant'Ambroeus a Milano.
È del 1973 la personale a Selva di Fasano (Brindisi), presso l'hotel Sierra Silvana.
Il 1974 si apre con una mostra itinerante in Grecia, Turchia, Romania, e Unione Sovietica con un gruppo di cinquanta opere recenti e nell'occasione la televisione italiana dedica al pittore e alla mostra un intero servizio. A seguito del successo ottenuto, Ferdinando Ambrosino viene invitato al Premio Brunelleschi di Firenze, alla rassegna Arte-Sport di Merano, al Premio Aldebaran di Sassuolo. E ancora, a Waterbury, negli Stati Uniti, alla biennale organizzata dal Culture Art Center, al terzo Premio Giuseppe Bazzoli di Milano, al Premio Città di Soresina a Cremona e ordina un'esposizione personale al Centro d'Arte Serio di Napoli.
La ricerca costante rivela, attraverso la materia pittorica, il senso e la presenza dell'uomo e della natura. Nelle opere di questo periodo trova espressione una certa forza drammatica legata a temi epico-popolari.
Il 1975 conferma un'ulteriore presenza alla galleria Marcos Castillo di Caracas in Venezuela con grande successo di critica e di pubblico. Mentre una successiva versione della stessa si tiene a Napoli al Centro d'Arte Serio.
E ancora nello stesso anno viene pubblicata una monografia sull'artista con particolare attenzione alle opere realizzate nel quindicennio 1960-1975. Il volume è curato dal critico e scrittore napoletano Domenico Rea che nel presentare l'opera di Ambrosino mette in rilievo le qualità specifiche della sua pittura, tutte legate alle sue origini partenopee e al grande bagaglio culturale a esse connesso.
Una mostra personale alla galleria Carlo Levi di Milano anticipa, nel 1976, quella che sarà la svolta e la sofferta ansia di mutamento del 1977, allorché Ambrosino decide una pausa di riflessione. Difatti, proprio nel 1977, affronta la scelta di nuovi materiali: la materia è la ceramica, che presenta mezzi di espressione plastica molto vasti e procedimenti indefinitamente mutevoli e sempre propizi all'inventiva.
Sollecitato dalle seduzioni che questa attività gli offre, realizza una grande serie di piatti murali e molte sculture in terracotta, vasi, piastrelle e pannelli di varie dimensioni.
Nel 1978 organizza una mostra personale a Nola, al Centro d'Arte Globo e nel 1979 è presente al Premio nazionale 79 a Eraclea mare, e a Caracas al Centro d'Arte Euroamericano
Nel 1980 il Museo en la casa del correo, a Ciudad Bolivar, nell'Orinoco in Venezuela, acquisisce una sua opera.
Nel 1982, con il patrocinio della Regione Campania, l'Azienda di cura e soggiorno di Ischia organizza una grande mostra che raccoglie i lavori del decennio 1972-1982. La mostra si tiene nel prestigioso Castello Aragonese di Ischia. Nello stesso anno ordina una personale alla galleria Il Cannocchiale di Milano. Inoltre, riceve a Caracas la “condecoracion del Orden Andres Bello” per meriti artistici, consegnatagli dal Ministro della pubblica istruzione Rafael Fernandez Heres.
Il 1983 può considerarsi l'anno della svolta e del grande passo in avanti nella pittura e nella vita di Ferdinando Ambrosino. L'impegno politico, da parte dell'artista, per la città e per il suo patrimonio artistico e ambientale viene premiato dal consenso popolare che si traduce nell'elezione a sindaco di Bacoli.
Nel 1981 aveva conosciuto il critico e storico d'arte Carmine Benincasa, che non poco inciderà nella sua vita artistica e in quella del territorio campano. Difatti, nello stesso anno, l'amministrazione comunale di Bacoli, sotto la prestigiosa direzione scientifica e artistica di Carmine Benincasa, organizza l'ormai celebre e storica mostra Sapere-Sapore , una rassegna delle arti in Italia dal 1958 al 1985, nel Castello Aragonese di Baia.
L'esposizione, oltre che raccogliere le più importanti firme dell'arte contemporanea italiana, segna un punto fermo nella storia della pittura e della scultura nell'Italia meridionale di questi ultimi decenni. “Il meridione”, scrive Carmine Benincasa in prefazione al catalogo, “non piange sulle catastrofi, né rivendica briciole di elemosina o carità pietistica o assistenzialismo parassitario. Il sud esercita il suo diritto alla giustizia sociale, generando eventi culturali, provocando scommesse di iniziative pubbliche, rischiando ogni volta di urlare meno il fatto di essere stato lacerato e emarginato nel globale progetto politico della vita del paese, per poter affermare un po' di più che la cultura e l'arte contano come i problemi sociali, che il suo tessuto non è soltanto l'oscena empietà sociale e l'iniqua capacità di un programma politico adatto alla sua storia e alla sua tradizione sociale e culturale, piuttosto è il rischio di una scommessa di esistere come progetto”.
Nel 1984 ordina una mostra personale a Napoli al Centro d'Arte Serio con un raggruppamento di opere di grandi dimensioni realizzate negli anni 1980-1984.
L'anno che segue può ritenersi un periodo di grande riflessione, ma anche un anno decisivo perché rappresenta una svolta sostanziale nella sua ricerca costante. Matura una nuova espressione, una visione più dilatata della realtà. Secondo quanto afferma il critico Franco Farina: “A differenza di lavori precedenti, si riscontra ora una più autonoma invenzione, una superiore potenzialità emozionale, arricchita di complessità operative che sono modulate in un vivace cromatismo di impronta mediterranea”.
Nel 1986 tiene una mostra personale al Centro d'Arte Serio e con il patrocinio del Comune di Ferrara viene organizzata una grande rassegna antologica al Palazzo dei Diamanti. Nel catalogo — dove è presentato da Franco Farina, Carmine Benincasa e Gianni Race — viene sottolineata l'importanza della ricerca di Ferdinando Ambrosino nella storia artistica italiana del secondo dopoguerra. “Questa mostra”, scrive Carmine Benincasa in catalogo, “ricapitola un'avventura pittorica, una scommessa di vita, di coscienza culturale, d'interpretazione del mondo che si rivela e le cose si fanno avanti”.
Nel 1987 tiene una mostra antologica al Centro d'Arte Serio e nel 1988 ancora una personale in Venezuela al Centro d'Arte Euroamericano di Caracas
Chiude il decennio ottanta con un'importante rassegna a carattere antologico alla galleria La Scaletta di Matera. Fino all'inizio degli anni novanta, pur nell'ambito di una forma espressiva personalissima e di una soluzione cromatica coraggiosa, Ferdinando Ambrosino rimane inscritto, anche se con soluzioni originali e poeticamente autonome, nell'ampia cerchia della pittura figurativa.
Nel 1989-1990 la grande svolta: la sua pittura è alfine libera. Finalmente il suo grido di libertà, la fuga dalle costrizioni delle forme, la creazione di arcobaleni di un nuovo universo di luce e di un alfabeto senza alcuna paternità, la costruzione del quadro in un nuovo progetto architettonico, la violenza della scala cromatica alternata alle stagioni di una morbidezza orientale, generano geografie ove i protagonisti espressivi del modo di sentire dell'artista sono il rosso e il nero, sintomi di una sapienza irreversibile della sua pittura.
Si tratta dei colori della tragedia greca, e non a caso. La zona in cui l'artista vive, quella dei Campi Flegrei, è un'area intrisa di mitologia greca, è la Magna Grecia. Sono qui gli antri della Sibilla cumana, dai quali si levava l'oracolo divinatorio.
I paesaggi non sono più quelli della natura, come nelle opere del periodo precedente, sono paesaggi dell'anima. I colori che modulano toni e timbri sono in sintonia con i sentimenti dell'artista, di cui sono squarci espressivi e rivelatori i grigi pervasi da malinconia, neri e grigi ocra con sfumature boscacee speculari alla brace ardente sotto la cenere, rossi che squarciano e infiammano senza devastare, gialli opachi e viola disseminati come grumi leggeri di speranza e spiaggia a riparo.
Nel 1989, Ambrosino partecipa alla Fiera internazionale di arte contemporanea presso l'Expo di Bari.
Nel 1990 con il patrocinio del Ministero per i beni culturali, della Regione Lazio, della Regione Campania e del Comune di Roma, e con la direzione artistica del professor Carmine Benincasa, si realizza la grande esposizione nel complesso monumentale di San Michele a Ripa a Roma, con opere che ripercorrono un trentennio di lavoro di Ferdinando Ambrosino.
Per l'occasione esce il volume Ferdinando Ambrosino , edito da Spirali, con testi di Carmine Benincasa e Armando Verdiglione.
Nello stesso anno a Viterbo, nel Palazzo degli Alessandri, la Provincia di Viterbo organizza una mostra con lavori del decennio 1980-1990 e, nel mese di ottobre, l'artista realizza un'altra mostra, denominata Esperienze flegree, presso Pozzuoli, sul lungomare Yalta. Infine, viene nominato membro effettivo del senato accademico dall'Accademia Internazionale d'Arte Moderna a Roma.
Nel 1991, Ambrosino prende parte alla mostra Napolinuova. Passione civile e autonomie poetiche , curata da Vitaliano Corbi presso il Maschio Angioino di Napoli; sono dello stesso anno la mostra 30x30 by 30 , presso la Ambrosino Gallery di Coral Gables in Florida, USA, e una grande mostra organizzata nell'isola di Creta dal Ministro della cultura. Nel luglio-agosto 1991, il pittore prende parte con un gruppo di opere alla mostra diretta da Carmine Benincasa L'Europa nell'arte italiana a Torre Pallotta Altomonte; infine, ordina una personale presso la galleria Ca' d'Oro di Roma.
Il 1992 è segnato da una grande mostra a Parigi presso la prestigiosa galleria d'arte Paris Art Center. Per l'occasione viene pubblicato un volume sull'opera dell'artista con scritti di Carmine Benincasa, Armando Verdiglione, Fernando Arrabal, Alice Granger, Gabi Gleichmann, Roger Dadoun, Dominique Desanti, Toni Brachet, Aleksej Nikolaev, Julius Edlis, Jean-Pierre Faye. Nello stesso anno è invitato a esporre presso il Musée du Bastion Saint André ad Antibes, in Costa Azzurra.
Nel 1993 tiene due personali molto significative, una a Caracas, presso la galleria Centro d'Arte Euroamericano e l'altra in Florida, a Miami, presso la Ambrosino Gallery. L'anno seguente, cioè nel 1994, organizza una mostra a New York presso la Spazio Italia Gallery. In catalogo scritti di Letizia Triches e Carmine Benincasa. “È un momento molto importante nel percorso artistico di Ambrosino”, afferma Carmine Benincasa, “egli lavora da alcuni anni a un interminabile e dilatante ciclo pittorico sul tema dell'icona”. Questi dipinti sono la sua riflessione teologica, la sua rivoluzione che ignora movimenti ideologici o riferimenti teorici, una riflessione che riguarda solo la pittura. Ancora: “[...] l'icona russa è il cominciamento di queste opere. Si tratta di work in progress che riconduce a vaga forma tutta l'esperienza visiva e storica dell'artista e tutto il sapere acquisito lungo il processo formativo della sua coscienza. Ma giunto all'esito finale della pittura, la libertà è diventata totale e incondizionata”.
Il 1995 è caratterizzato da due mostre personali in due città europee. Una a Ginevra presso la galleria-libreria La deuxième renaissance, l'altra a Marbella alla galleria El Catalejo. Nel 1996 ordina due mostre personali, una a Ferrara presso la galleria Il secondo rinascimento e l'altra a Milano presso la galleria Il Cannocchiale. In catalogo scritti di Osvaldo Patani e Vitaliano Corbi. Partecipa a Lineart 96 di Gand, Belgio. Nell'autunno di quest'anno ordina una seconda mostra personale, sul tema ormai predominante delle icone, a New York, presso la Spazio Italia Gallery.
Nel 1997 viene invitato a esporre a San Francisco presso l'Istituto Italiano di Cultura e nello stesso anno espone a Napoli nella chiesa di San Francesco delle Monache, il tema ormai predominante delle icone. In catalogo, per le edizioni Il Corvo, testi di Aniello Montano, Vitaliano Corbi, Ciro Ruju. Nel 1999, a Roma, presso il parco regionale dell'Appia Antica (ex Cartiera Latina), con il patrocinio della Regione Lazio assessorato alla cultura, si tiene la mostra personale Il rebus della memoria , a cura di Barbara Rose e Fernando Arrabal.
Nel 2001, Ambrosino organizza una personale presso la Galerie Elektra di Sausalito in San Francisco.
Nel 2002 prende parte alla mostra Lights, colours and forms of the third millenium presso il Kunst Centre di Silkeborg Bad, in Danimarca. È inoltre presente all'Expo Arte della 23a edizione della Fiera Internazionale di Bari e prende parte con due opere alla grande mostra Artisti italiani a Parigi. Infine, partecipa alla mostra Iconografie. Pittura e scultura a confronto a cura di Ciro Ruju presso la Villa Vatia di Napoli.
La forza progettuale del pittore si esprime con linee scure, profili di forme e di cose senza identità, che si contengono e si sgretolano generando sulla superficie del quadro un movimento continuo, un intricato groviglio di tempesta e di vita, di passione, di fede, di partecipazione e impegno definitivo al ritmo del vivere.
In questo vortice di segni è tuttavia possibile decifrare ancora frammenti di una realtà che è stata trasformata nell'arcobaleno luministico che l'artista ci lascia in eredità. Ambrosino infatti non ha rinunciato alla realtà, che rimane il suo punto di partenza; se ne è svincolato, ha impedito che essa fosse una sbarra di ferro di prigione, cosicché nelle sue opere convivono astrazione e figurazione, ossia la libertà espressiva della coscienza.
La pittura figurativa degli anni passati è ormai definitivamente avviata verso una soluzione evocativa, di suggestione di luce in cui ogni forma si slabbra, si dirada e rinvia sempre oltre, verso un universo “altro”, attraverso l'immenso potere evocativo della coscienza immaginativa.
Barbara Rose
- The Icon as Iconography
And now was acknowledged the presence of the Red Death. He had come like a thief in the night. And one by one dropped the revelers in the blood bedewed halls of their revel, and died each in the despairing posture of his fall. And the life of the ebony clock went out with that of the gay. And the flames of the tripods expired. And Darkness and Decay and the Red Death held illimitable dominion over all.
(Edgar Allan Poe, The Masque of the Red Death)
Ferdinando Ambrosino began as a painter of landscapes, only to become a painter of icons. How and why did such a radical transformation, which suggests more
than ordinary stylistic evolution, take place? Such a dramatic change of subject,
content and form suggests an event of major significance,a psychological awakening
brought on by nothing less than a spiritual epiphany or an emotional trauma.
In
Ambrosino's case, his decision to abandon a pleasing style of cheerful, abstract
landscapes based on Impressionist precedent appears to have been triggered by
the sudden vision of the meaning of the catastrophic events of our century.
Already in the early years of the twentieth century, the Spanish philosopher Miguel
propheticallydefined modem historicalconsciousness as "el sentimiento tragico de la vida."
This existential tragic sense of life is common to those who
think and feel deeply in any given time, but the events of our own epoch have
heightened our degree of consciousness to a new and painful awareness, which
eventually became the content of Ambrosino's paintings. In this connection it is
significant that Ambrosino was born on the even of World War II in Bacoli outside
of Naples and that he was trained as a geologist. His knowledge of geology surely
sensitized him to the idea of the metaphor of strata of experience, layers of buried
history, to be excavated for their meaning.
That the artist was born in the shadow of the major ancient archaeological site of Cuma is also significant in relation to the imagery he ultimately developed to express his sense of history. In antiquity, the area near Bacoli that is now an archaeological park was famed and feared as the home of that most redoubtable prophetess, the Cumaean Sybil.
According to Virgil, the entrance to the gates of hell was near the cave where Aeneas consulted the Sybil. In the sixth book of Aeneid, the Sybil appears to the founder of Rome. Later, King Tarquin acquired the sibylline books sacred to the Roman State. In the shadows of the caves of Cuma the Greeks consulted the divine oracle who was the medium of transmission of the messages of the gods. There, the mysterious and terrifying Sybil inhaled hallucinogenic gas and in a trance responded to questions the priest interpreted.
The subterranean caves are near Lake Avernus where water accumulated near the volcano's crater.
In a spot as rich in historical memory as the en virons of Cuma, dark shades and
phantoms of history are sure to hide. Originally, Cuma was a village in the Campi
Flegrei, now it is an archaeological park where ghosts of the past and fragments
of history interact with nature.
Cuma was founded by Greek colonists from
Chalcedon who believed that winged Daedalus landed there and built a temple to
Apollo. Christians transformed the temple of Apollo into a basilica where Christ
was worshiped. In ancient times, the mound of Cuma, now crossed by labyrinthine
underground passages, were excavated by the military architects of the
Emperor Augustus. He originally joined Cuma to Port Julius of Lake Avernus through a tunnel. The Byzantines of Narses eventually conquered the area, which
in turn was besieged by the Goths from the North who built a castle to defend their conquest.
The historic strata of such a place thus become part of a collective memory of
bloody conquest and resurrection.
The labyrinth caverns at Cuma are dark and shadowed; surely they must prefigure
the compartmentalized "icons" that Ambrosino began to paint at the beginning of
the nineties. Housed in the shadowy recesses of Ambrosino's icons which recall
the dark secrets of Cuma, figures twist and turn, faces appear and disappear in the dark mists of a dream.
The stylized drapery that shrouds the figures have an ambiguity further confused
in the shadowy recesses of memory, where thoughts struggle to become
conscious, only to remain half formed, then to dissolve back into the darkness of
the unconscious.
The allusions, however, are not to any specific autobiographical
memories, rather they are hints of collective memory. The vignettes,
housed within the cell-like compartments, each tell a different but similar story. They allude to narratives of conflicts, struggles and martyrdom taking place in the secrecy of decaying niches that remind us of the underground caverns of Fellini's Satyricon in which the decadence of the last days of the Roman empire are subliminally substituted for those of the decadence of the post War dolce vita,
which had its ultimate manifestation in the darkest depravity of the crimes of
corruption of the succeeding decades characterized by the worst scandals of the
"tangentopoli" and its orgiastic modus vivendi
Not the private realm
of specific trauma, but the collective tribulations of the race are commemorated
in the shadows of the caves of Cuma, where the Sybil prophesied dark events to come. This idea of a connection, a door, or an entrance to a nether world in Ambrosino'spaintings becomes a, metaphor for access to the unconscious and the world of dreams.
Known as the oldest and most important destination of the Aegean navigators,
Cuma was discovered in the eighth century B.C. by the Chalcedonians from
the island of Eubea. There they founded the farthest outpost of the Greek colonies in the Tyrrhenian Sea, leaving their alphabet and other advances. Cuma,
thus was from the first associated with empire and fall of empire. The story of the rise and fall of successive civilization chronicled by such historians as,
Giordano Bruno, Gibbons, and Toynbee include the transformations undergone by
Cuma, which was in turn used as a stone quarry, a pirate retreat, and storage depot. Its cell-like labyrinthine compartments were from their origin associated with fundamental myths of iman's creativity, his daring and his hubris.
We know, for example, that the gilded temple at Cuma was decorated with the image
of Daedalus mourning the fall of his son Icarus.
Ambrosino's early work was noted for his interest in large scale grandiose themes.
In the early sixties, he painted large, neo-realist paintings based on the theme of the struggles of the proletariat.
In 1965, a visit to the cave of the Cumaean Sybil was a turning point. Although he does not say so directly, apparently there he had a vision that slowly began to take shape in his painting. Certainly he knew that part of the story of Cuma concerned the origin of human creativity itself, since it is thought that this was the site where Daedalus fashioned the wings that permitted him to ascend to the heavens, but in the hands of his son Icarus become the emblem of hubris.
The finding of his vocation as an artist is not dissimilar to that of the Stephen Daedalus, the hero of James Joyce's Portrait of an Artist, who dedicates himself to the tradition of writing, addressing his ancestor "old father, old artificer, stand me now and ever in good stead.
By the Ambrosino nad nis first person show in 1967, the muscular figures of his early work had given way to lyrical landscapes that became increasingly abstract.
By the mid seventies, his work had a mature sophistication and a group of fifty
paintings were sent on tour in Greece, Turkey, Rumania and the Soviet Union.
These colourful, expressive paintings, full of light and motion, had
considerable success.
In 1977, the artist made a group of ceramic sculptures in
terra cotta that brought his attention back to the human figure. But, essentially, he
remained a landscape painter.
Towards the end of the eighties, however, the landscapes became darker and more turbulent. Despite their debt to
Cubism and abstract expressionism, theseworks were still clearly tied to nature.
In 1990, we find the human figure once again appearing in Ambrosino's works, but here the form is clearly in conflict with its context, seem-ing to be struggling for some kind of liberation from what appears to be the confinement of the picture plane and the rectangle. Instead of the stillness of the icon, we havewrithing movement, a seeming contradiction of the iconic format and its dedication to stasis and symmetry; symmetry becomes asymmetry, the conventions of east and west are hybridized.
The unquiet, uneasy figures suggest the desperation of Michelangelo's bound slaves struggling to escape their bindings, to burst forth from the block of stone that confines them to earth and mortality. Like Michelangelo's slaves, Ambrosino's figures suggest the human energy of expansion and search for an elusive freedom, the wish-for-whichis hubris itself.
...Ambrosino's contemporary adaptation of the structure of the Russian icon to the
purposes of an expressionist modem art raise questions concerning style, intention
and technique that are relevant within the context of postmodernism hybridization and appropriation. However, unlike media based postmodernism, Ambrosino's painterly painting makes a case not for reproduction but for the sensual
tactile qualities of the painterly original. In this, he consciously
adheres to the Western tradition as established in the Renaissance and not to earlier
archaic styles. Moreover, although there is reference to collective archetypes, each
of the intertwined figures and faces are individualized-another distinctly Western characteristic.
Drawing is essential to a pictographic sense and Ambrosino's ability to rapidly
delineate with a quick skipping fine line the notations that suggest figures in motion
became an important consideration.
The typology of the figures recalls Henry
Moore's drawings, which in turn inspired Jackson Pollock to create a kind
of picture-writing that dematerialized bodies into pictographic symbols.
Picture-writing, of course, is common to preliterate archaic cultures not yet capable of communicating inprint. The sense of condensed narrative is pre-served in Ambrosino's iconic compartments, which suggest scenes of terror and mystery, relating his vision to Delacroix's perfumed orientalizing style. Even the palette recalls the intense colour contrasts and dramatic violence of swooning figures expiring in the Death of Sardanapolous.
Like Delacroix, Ambrosino appreciates the luxury and lushness of curving sinuous forms and glowing painterly surfaces. In this orientalizing tendency, his work recalls the jewel tones and sfumato of the Symbolist paintings of Delacroix's heir Gustave Moreau, who transferred this late nineteenth century love of luxe claime and volupté to his most famous student, Henri Matisse. Byzantine art deformed and distorted the realistic space and scale of classical painting in a way that anticipates the compressed expressionism of modern art.
...In 1993, Ambrosino's figurative imagery began to take the specific form of icons. The compartments became clearer; their contents ever more spectral. Ghostly apparitions, indistinct and mysterious, flowed in and out of evanescent smoky space. Although not nameable or distinct, they suggested scenes, vignettes and narratives, like those found on the predellas of altarpieces or the panels of bridal cassone paintings.
Confronted by ambiguity, the viewer must supply the narrative of warriors and saints, combats on horseback, the historic battles of cavaliere and crusaders
The possibility of indicating monumental spacen in the format of the icon is intriguing. The problem of figuration is, of course, a central feature of modem art once it attempts to free itself from the conventions of representation
One solution to the spatial dilemma is to depict inside the frame in scenic vignettes. The compartments also speak of memories of the structure of Sistine Chapel. But what we see are not the scenes of the Old Testament, but tumbling forms and falling angels of the Last Judgment.
The painterliness of an expressionist style is heightened by the use of scumbling. Fragments of anatomy seem to suggest dismemberment; hands and feet, the tortured pain of medieval trumeau, the gothic arches, flames and glories, aureoles and night light pioneered by the pre-Caravaggists Moretto and Savoldo in the north of Italy.
Everything points to the conclusion that Ambrosino's subject is man's fate. The conception of history as a painful and repetitious narrative contradicts the ikonostasis, which represents the immobility of the static and the timeless, which is outside of history consciousness
Ambrosino replaces the ikonostasis with the mobile and ever-changing modem sense of mutation transformation and struggle. This is necessary to be true to our time because struggle and tension is the essence of the dialectic. In these terms, then the painter's job is to depict images in the process of assuming form while, resisting dissolution. In the shadowy recesses, evanescent figures appear as veiled. They remind us of shrouded figures in Henry Moore's drawings, which Jackson Pollock transformed into stenographic signs.
Pollock's veiled image as he defined it hid often horrific and terrifying imagery.
What is veiled is unnameable and unspeakable. In these "icons" depicting man's
fate, entangled humanity is seen in a variety of positions and gestures, both legible
and illegible.
The fine line of brush drawing often suggests bones just as the
darkness recalls the shadowy cavernsof The sense of a suffocating
imprisonment is that of Sartre's from which there is no escape.
The figures are engaged in an erotic dance of death; their writhing suggests on the
one hand, erotic engagement, and on the other, blazing funeral pyres, and
bindings and chains of enslavement.
Ambrosino's appropriation of
of Russian icons presents the possibility of using the stylisticconventions of civilization to refute those of our own. Thus the iconic structure becomes a carrier
of symbolic meaning as opposed to an occasion for sacred iconography.
The piety sincerity, and purity of the believing artisans who created these sacred
objects of worship is implicitly contrasted with the decadence, cynicism and
mondanity of our own time and its materialistic values. In the shadowy recesses
of memory thoughts struggle to become conscious, only to remain half formed
and dissolve.
Not the private realm of specific trauma but that of the human race
itself surface and are seen in depth in painting. The brushed canvas is skin, but is penetrated by dark gothic arches and archaeological references. The works are
full of various types of ambiguity, including palimpsests and pentimenti.
Information provided and omitted universalizing character, non specific, yet we
sense...echoes of lamentations and crucifixions.
The lava-like explosions that cause matter to spill out beyond the iconic confines
recalls the volcanic eruptions typical of the area around Naples that identify the
spot as a major geological shrine to earth's destructive power and the
potential for ecological catastrophe we feel more imminent day by day. In their
recollectionof the memory of earlier destruction, they are in themselves incarnations
of prophecy that should be studied and heeded. Thus the icons are signs, indeed
warning signs. They speak not of a stable and unchanging conception of the world,
but of a fluid and fugitive reality that we must grasp to understand.