Gabriele Di Matteo

Since the invention of photography in 1830’s, painting has been proclaimed dead many times and Di Matteo’s work goes along these lines. Gabriele Di Matteo’s paintings are an option for giving an idea a form and they are not a stand-alone artworks, but elements of larger artistic procedures. What has interested him since the 80’s and what he explores through painting is the relationship between the image and its creator, relationship between the copy and original and the problem of authenticity and authorship.

Di Matteo continues his exploration through this two part film. The celebration of Madonna dell’Arco dates back to 1450s’. The story goes that one day, an angry boy, who lost a game, threw a ball viciously at the painting of the Madonna and Child. To his astonishment, the Virgin began to bleed from the spot where the ball had bruised her left cheek. Since then, faithful Italians have flocked to Madonna dell’Arco’s shrine to pray for miracles and leave painted votive tablets as offerings.

In Naples, there is a community of commercial painters who can be commissioned to paint anything from ‘The Last Supper’ to a vase with flowers. They also specialise in particular themes making hundreds of paintings daily. They are known by their specialities, so, for example, Salvatore Russo, long time collaborator of Di Matteo, is known as Salvatore Mimosa. Di Matteo visited some of these studios in Naples and the vicinity.

These painters also make large paintings, sometimes taking the whole year to complete, preparing them for the procession held on Easter Monday in honour of Madonna dell’Arco. They are presented to the public and judged by a jury of people from the local community.

‘They literally make the paintings ‘dance’ in the streets, ‘talking’ and ‘singing’ as if they had come to life.

Similar to votive objects in their direct relationship with the dimensions of the sacred, these  paintings represent the maximum expression of artistic desire, as narrated in ancient legends: the desire to create a ‘living work’, an effigy that ‘comes to life’, a metamorphosis demonstrated when the winning painting is made to ‘bow’ before the sanctuary of Madonna’. (Andrea Viliani)

The painting by mysterious Armando della Vitoria representing the procession itself appears at 18:01min of this film. The film From The Boy Who Threw A Stone is in the collection of FRAC (Fonds regional d’art contemporain) Bretagne and MAMCO, Geneve.