A private portrait, be it a family portrait or an individual portrait, is an intimate possession.
I believe that a good portrait requires a high degree of what I like to call "Emotional Customization":
if I can understand my subjects, if I can get a glimpse of their personalities, their feelings, their dreams, then I will have the tools to create a unique and totally personalized work.
In other words, the foundation of my work is a process of communication, a shared journey, however brief, of introspection and expression.
WEDDING PORTRAITS AND SPECIAL EVENTS
A wedding portrait is something magical, and certainly among the projects I enjoy working on the most. On the day of the ceremony, alongside the official photographer, I follow the couple to capture the images needed for their portrait. Friends and family serve as my “assistants”, providing stories, anecdotes, details and anything else that can help me get to know my subjects better.
"Just Us"
Wedding Portrait
Canvas 80x120 cm.
I also create personalized artwork anniversaries, engagements or any other romantic event you'd like to fix in a picture.
I can travel to destination, domestically or internationally.
I am also available to work from images, which may be necessary in certain cases, such as when you want the portrait to be a surprise gift.
Original Photo - 1973
"I Ragazzi che si Amano"
50years Wedding
Anniversary Portrait
Canvas 100x100 cm.
I ragazzi che si amano
si baciano in piedi...
nell'abbagliante chiarezza
del loro 1°amore.
(Prevert)
PROCEDURE:
A GOOD PORTRAIT IS THE RESULT OF A HUMAN JOURNEY
A personal connection is the starting point for each of my artistic endeavors. This isn't just a cliché or a gimmicky thing to say: my goal is to create truly personalized, emotively customized portrait. Therefore, I consider getting to know my clients as one of the most important and exciting part of my work, the experience has taught me that when I'm able to establish a genuine, meaningful relationship with the subject(s) I depict, then that empathy - that emotional charge – will translate to the painting, which in turn will be able to connect with its owner and move its viewers. In practical terms, the first step is a meeting with the client, in which we get to know each other and begin discussing ideas for the work. This may be arranged at the client's home. Ideally, if it’s possible, I like to have a look at the setting where the painting will hang, this helps me decide on appropriate size and chromatic choices. Next comes the official photo session, which may take place in studio or on location, according to the specifics of the individual project. An additional photo session, either with or without the subject(s), may sometimes be desired, for example when particular background, landscape or symbolic elements are to be included in the portrait.
Once all the photos are edited, I will send the client a selection of jpegs via email, and from there we'll begin narrowing down the choice to the image(s) that will serve as basis for the painting. At this stage, the client will also provide any other materials he/she would like to incorporate in the work. (the list of possibilities is endless, but these are usually things that are particularly dear to the subject, such as a quote, poem or song, old photographs, cut-outs from newspapers, magazines or personal journals... I've even used a piece of someone's T-shirt, and a movie theater stub from a couple's first date). Once the groundwork has been laid, I will get to work on the portrait.
Time of completion varies according to my schedule and to the project's demands, but is usually in the order of 3/4 weeks.
Although the above is the preferable procedure, I understand there are times when meeting face-to-face with the subject(s) is not possible due to a variety of reasons, such as when a portrait is commissioned as a surprise gift for someone. In those cases, I am available to work remotely from images (as long as the resolution is adequate) and through information provided over the phone.
For any info you can write me here: info@marcellomanca.it
Art "gets married" with the works of Marcello Manca:
the last trend is to treat yourself with a painting
by Chiara Besana
The beauty of my job lies in the new people and stories that I get to know every day. Sometimes you chase an interview for months, some others you go meet a celebrity and other days, almost by chance, you bump into someone who hits you right away because of what they do or especially what they have to tell you.
The last time it happened was a couple of weeks ago. It was a morning like any other and I was going to the usual bar where I get a coffee every day. With the croissant in one hand and the cup in the other, I was looking at the numerous faces of the people pouring into the Graziano pastry shop in Milan every morning, an unmissable stop to get your day off to a good start. But all of a sudden, the eye dropped on a painting hanged on the wall in front of the counter that I had never watched carefully.
On the canvas is a portrait of four people, so similar to the owners that they look real, almost as if they were coming out of the canvas, posing as I see them every morning, with a smile on their lips and a coffee machine behind them. I watched it for several minutes trying to figure out if it was a beautiful portrait perfectly resembling the original or a black and white picture. Then, when I asked about it, I discovered that it was an elegant and amazing mix of art and photography by an artist named Marcello Manca. I was so curious that I wanted his contact to get to know him and have him tell me all the secrets of this new way of making art or perhaps photography.
In meeting this artist-painter —who has loved painting since he was a child experimenting the most varied techniques until he came to a way of interpreting the emotions of those in front of him— I discovered the last frontier of photography or perhaps of art, in which these two passions and languages are mixed in a visceral, unexpected and at times astonishing "marriage". Certainly, it is not the first time that these two arts meet contaminating each other, but the difference in Marcello Manca's works is the fact that all this is made for important or even crucial moments in the life of a person or a couple: a wedding, a birth, an expectation, an engagement.
These are the moments immortalised on canvases in which the image of a shot, the materic brushstrokes of acrylic, the veiling of the colour, newspaper cuttings, poems, important thoughts and much more are combined. Wedding photography has changed a lot over the years; from an often apathetic and artificial pose in a portrait it has become an exciting and spontaneous reportage.
Now the last frontier in terms of wedding shots seems to be the one crossed by this artist who already counts among his works important exhibitions and collaborations with well-known faces of show business and fashion. Like an ancient court artist who was commissioned family portraits for important moments to remember, so he is called for a special gift to be given to the bride and groom, without their knowledge, or perhaps for a special thought by a wife or husband on the occasion of their wedding anniversary. The ability to take a real work of art out of a shot and hang it on the wall of the house without ever getting tired of it is for Marcello an art halfway between the sensitive and refined art of maieutic, indispensable to imprint on the canvas moments like a “yes” between two young people, an exchange of rings, a tender maternal hug or the ability to stop time.
“When they ask me to make a painting, first I go and inspect where they would like to put it, — he explains to me during our meeting, and continues— it is fundamental to decide colours and dimensions. Then I have the clients explain to me what their passions are. Here is when they often reveal to me extraordinary things from which the ideas of my paintings come out spontaneously. From there I do a photo shoot and then dedicate myself to painting. Also, if they have a photo with a strong emotional value, I can start from that and rework it".
And so exciting works are born allowing those who receive them to see beyond the appearance, be moved and feel the painting deeply and intimately. Here a moment of one's life is then hanged on the wall of the living room or bedroom like a still image full of unspoken words or sensations made immortal by the brush of a modern artist, a bit photographer and a bit dreamer.