Le Firme di Exclusive
Trilingual
Printed in Arezzo, Italy Distributed throughout
Europe
Summer 2002
(Page 6)
Benini
From the “Appennini” to “Le Stelle”
From the Author Leonardo Maniscalchi:
A
Journey into the Colours of the Soul
(The Man of the Enchanted Marshes)
I
was introduced to Benini in 1987 in Orlando, Florida as well as to his
collector friend Ralph in one of my shows. From then on, a mutual sense of
affection was born. I would dare say a brotherhood in art. I remember, with
extreme pleasure, his invitation to the place where he found potential
inspiration. It was a thirty minute boat trip to the St. John River marshes
in Florida. Finally, after having faced numerous dangers (water fill-ups,
hungry alligators, snakes of all kinds, quicksands), we arrived to an
enchanting place, a disturbing scenery, unique in the world, an ephemeral
landscape. Carnivorous aquatic plants, black water and a deep green, where
good and bad reigned in a delightful harmony that was contaminated by
beauty. Personally, I thought of having entered into the ghostly world of
the garden of delights of H. Bosch and while I was panting, I noticed a sort
of purification and mental cleansing.
Through his research, Benini would finally be able to understand and find
himself (his conscience). He came to the “planet” to purify his soul, to
search for the truth: “the essence of existence”, leaving behind him the
poisons and discomforts of the contaminations of the world. He had received
the gift of meditation that was founded on a reality generated by the ultra
corpus. I knew by intuition that he could draw from his dreams and transform
them from subconscious reality to objective truth. “To know oneself better
in order to be able to understand others”, Freud, evocating the thought of
James Hillman, a Dallas analyst, who used to say that one must be like the
Dream Catcher natives.
Benini had understood that by taking me into those marshes, I would have
stopped, looked around, appreciated that extraordinary beauty of nature and
absorbed those wonderful marvels. I understood that paradise exists and
it’s inside of us. “The Man of the Enchanted Marshes” gave me the
opportunity to re-live in another new dimension, a more human dimension.
In V. Kandinsky’s 1910 text, it was theorized that art is capable of
abandoning its pretense and represent reality in order to create what gives
shape to the “inner world of the arts.” Essence is supposed to substitute
the object. It’s a universe of internal sensations represented by pure
colours made of a chromatic alchemy. It is not necessarily academic and
figurative, but an art that comes from the purity of the mental state and
spiritual reality, not of religious nature but, instead, capable of
expressing the most rational and mystical experiences of existence.
Favored by his cultural background, Benini rooted himself on the perfection
of the great “geniuses of perspective” such as Piero della Francesca, Giotto,
Veronesi, who were creators of sublime beauty, to the point of reaching
metaphysical-surrealism, artistic research and the spiritual integrity of
cultural art. Benini signs with his purity, a talented work, created with
the aura of human capriciousness and love.
Christ had the need of searching his soul by staying in the desert for forty
days in order to find the key to his answers. Benini interrogates himself
by being in contact with nature in the “marshes and the universe,” facing
many dangers and obstacles (a star war”, in the skies and on earth, such as
the night of St. Lawrence where the cosmos and the microcosm amalgamate into
one and form myriads of stars, while we, humans, remain with the sole desire
of making a wish).
…….In the end, one remains ecstatic at the sight of Benini’s works. They are
meditative thoughts, and iconic explorations. He sculpts and paints with a
light that belongs only to him because “his colors” that do not exist in
reality are his code of a cultured language. The artist signs with the
purity of his mind’s effort, creates with the aura of its humanity from his
poetic inspiration and from his love…
--Leonardo Maniscalchi
Translated from Italian text-Exclusive Magazine Summer 2002
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