John Vitale

The Stars Are Screaming Beneath the Lies

2025

Acrylic and graphite on gessoboard

Acrylic paint and aluminum leaf on acrylic glass. 22" diameter. This is a time that has forced us to redefine. Redefine how we live, how we interact, how we see, what we value. Th...

"Bodacious" 2023, 72" x 72" square. An oversized, large-scale, bold and dramatic abstract painting consisting of acrylic, house paint, pencils, and oil pastels on canvas by Argentine...

Artist's Statement: "I had been making some very colorful paintings based on rings or circles that have been very well received, but my forms and brushstrokes began to tighten and feel a little restrained. So I decided to change both the forms and the strokes, and lose a lot of the color, and do something different for awhile. I stayed with simple forms as in general I am much more interested in surface and color anyway. With this painting, after I had finished the central piece, I felt it lacked gravitas due mostly to size, and so I decided to affix the canvas to an underlying canvas painted in a very flat black color, with texture to it (I actually used house paint for this, which is perfect for what I wanted). So the painting is actually a canvas attached to another, and has three-dimensionality to it. You can see in the close-ups the "strokiness" I was after. I think this painting has a sort of Rothko-ish, iconic quality to it, but without the gravitas." Recent message from a 1stDibs buyer and seasoned collector about a painting in the prior "ring" series: "Love your work. We collect colorists like Wolf Kahn and Jennifer Bartlett, whom I commissioned a piece from that is in the entrance of Mayo Clinic. We are old fans...