"Nigredo", Portrait of a friend Painting

"When in one of my works I mention someone else's, or when I scrupulously copy the masterpieces of the past, I know I am not original or expressing particular ideas; but I share feelings, emotions and universal meanings. I see myself as a simple narrator and perpetuator of archetypes and techniques. Citing and paying homage to colleagues and Masters has always been normal in the past and it is what has allowed man to improve the means and the expression of traditional values, as well as to avoid that so many works lost, stolen or destroyed, disappeared forever. From a certain point on, all this was sacrificed on the altar of the search for the new and for originality: what derived from it was an incremental loss of quality in almost all areas." Massimo Tizzano Zuigan is an Italian painter mainly inspired by the works of Baroque painters such as Titian, Rembrandt, Caravaggio and many other Ancient Masters. He has been drawing and painting since he was a child, but he began his formal education in the visual arts field only much later in life, with the practice of Japanese calligraphy (Shodo) under the guidance of Sensei Norio Nagayama from whom he received the name Oto Mi and the qualification to teach the principles of this noble art. After 8 years of practice with Indian ink and rice paper, he began painting with oil paints and began studying the oil painting techniques of the Italian and Flemish masters of the fifteenth and seventeenth centuries as self-taught. In 2010 he met the work of Odd Nerdrum and in 2012 he was selected to become his studio assistant in Norway, where he deepened his painting technique and the understanding of kitsch philosophy related to the history of art. Tizzano has been operating in the artistic and cultural sector for over ten years, dealing with the creation and reproduction of works of art according to traditional painting techniques, the preparation of themed exhibitions, as well as the organization of practical theoretical courses related to the ancient traditional techniques of oil painting. In particular Tizzano is known for making art copies of the most beloved Masters of the most flourishing and significant period of Western painting (14th / 17th century: Leonardo, Caravaggio, Ver Meer, Rembrandt, Perugino, Cagnacci, etc.). The copies, faithfully realized according to the techniques and materials of originals, boast national and international awards and admirers.