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Miaz Brothers, The Innovator, 2020
Miaz Brothers - The Hazy Reality of the New World
Shanghai 27 February - 23 April 2021“At some point we felt the urgency to do something with painting… We conceived the fundamental concept of erasing the lines to gain a flawless movement of colors by juxtaposing millions of dots apparently dissociated from each other to form something not instantly evident but visible from a distance.”
— Miaz Brothers
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Miaz Brothers
“We are working around the ‘perception’ and not the ‘representation’…” This is how Italian artists Roberto and Renato Miaz (a.k.a the Miaz Brothers), two brothers born in 1965 and 1968 in Monza, Italy, describe their artistic approach.
They use fine sprays of aerosol paint to achieve what they call “a substantial indetermination of the picture.” And indeed their works rely on the power of suggestion more than they seek to represent a tangible "reality". The blurring technique of the artists seems to act like an eraser obliterating the details and outlines of the world. Faces and landscapes, or at least what we perceive of them, remain hazy and will remain so "for eternity", as art critic Marco Meneguzzo points out.
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Miaz BrothersThe Star, 2020Acrylic and spraycan on canvas130 x 100 cm
51 1/8 x 39 3/8 in -
Miaz BrothersThe Lady, 2020Acrylic and spraycan on canvas130 x 100 cm
51 1/8 x 39 3/8 in -
Miaz BrothersLa Madonna dagli Occhi Azzurri, 2019Acrylic and spraycan on canvas130 x 100 cm
51 1/8 x 39 3/8 in -
Miaz BrothersThe Innovator, 2020Acrylic and spraycan on canvas80 x 65 cm
31 1/2 x 25 5/8 in
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The Man with the Castle, 2020
In their work, the two siblings play on the classical idea of "mimesis”, which spans through art history and questions the link between art and reality. They reverse the concept by blurring our view instead of directly presenting us with a "representation" of reality. This intentional hijacking of our perception urges us to emancipate ourselves from reality in order to rebuild, through our imagination, a whole new reality or even a whole new world. As the artists say: « By removing the details, the eye cannot focus on the picture like it does on everyday items. » The viewer, whose gaze is put to the test, is made “to pause and think and create by [himself or herself] an image, a resemblance. »
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Live from the studio
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Girl with the Flowers, 2020
Thus the Miaz Brothers play with our instinctive impulse to see, to want to decipher what is in front of us. In each of their works, the viewer's imagination and the attentiveness of his or her gaze are being challenged. Our eyesight flakes out and our desire to know grows stronger. For Meneguzzo, this is how we are made to feel both frustration and attraction. Far from being contradictory, these two feelings complement each other to create a lasting feeling about each of the works. For the two brothers, it is a matter of really capturing Man in all its complexity: “For us it is a way to express our idea of ourselves as humans, as beings that are sensitive to their environment, to experiences, as we continually evolve and adapt.”
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Miaz Brothers at work
While curating the 2019 Watch this space show in London, Danysz invited Miaz Brothers to make monumental size portraits on the wall. Watch the video to relive this moment.
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The Star, 2020
From 1980 to 1984, the Miaz brothers studied at the Artistic High School of Cantu, in the province of Como in Italy, before joining the IED (European Institute of Design) in Milan. Far from wanting to pursue the classic academic path (high school, academy then art galleries), the two brothers preferred to travel and feed on all the knowledge about philosophy or technique available to them, developing an open-mindedness prone to fueling their art.
In 1989, the Miaz brothers presented their first solo exhibitions: “Skins” in Faenza, Italy, then “The Anarchists” in Riccione in 1990, then “The Artists” in 1991, and “Safe Box” in Pisa in 1994, as well as “ New Age” in Rimini the following year.
In 1996 in Milan, at Via Farini Gallery, the two artists presented a body of work on genetics and visual perception, with pieces called “Piercing”, “Timecode”, “Hyperspace”. Their purpose being to immerse the viewers in a new reality by making use, among other things, of sound and light installations actively engaging their senses.
Little by little, with the birth of “PCs”, the first personal computers, the Miaz Brothers took an unexpected turn in their artistic journey. The digital world acted as a “new medium” that opened up new unsuspected horizons. The two artists appropriated new modes of representation and production. They collaborated with major international brands like Adidas, Swatch and Nike to reach the largest public and raise awareness about art. From 1996 to 2000, they embarked alternately on different isolated projects, temporarily putting on hold their gallery presence.
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The Muse, 2020
« We were inspired by a set of concepts that we have collected over years of philosophical research... We read a lot, traveled, met so many people, learned many things in order to be able to define ourselves, as men... »
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Far from stopping there, the two globetrotters kept on traveling and, with the arrival of the new millennium, sensed the beginning of a "new chapter". They moved to New York and started to explore a whole new artistic field: that of photography. During the summer of 2001, they returned to Paris for 5 years and resumed collaborating with well-known brands (Elite, Diesel, Puma, Kenzo…).
Having explored all these diverse horizons, the Miaz Brothers decided to go back to their original passion: painting. First they experimented in the streets, finding there a multiplicity of supports to entertain their imagination: house walls, tall buildings, bungalows... This choice to devote themselves to painting, in a time when the medium is experiencing some degree of disaffection, is significant. Swimming against the tide, they did not hesitate to affirm their love of the classical masters of the 15th, 16th, 17th and 13th centuries, whether Dutch, French or Italian, finding inspiration in masterpieces by Leonardo da Vinci, Vermeer, Raphael and more.
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The Silk Merchant, 2020
In 2008, the two brothers settled in Amsterdam, then moved a few years later to Valencia, Spain. In 2010, they received the biennial Art Prize from the Museum of Amposta in Barcelona. The following year, they were awarded the Laguna International Art Prize in Venice.
In 2012, the two brothers focused on serial works, with the “Antimatter series” in Milan or the “Masters series” in Venice: their new playground centered around the ideas of matter and antimatter, around physical and philosophical concepts. Their portraits, oscillating between incarnation and disembodiment, created a form of porosity between these two states of matter. No linear brushstroke is present in the works of the “Antimatter series”, because far from being a means of structuring the painting, lines are “barriers” that interfere with the overall balance of the work, as critic Louis Perez Pont explains.
In 2013, the exhibition “Angels & Demons” was held in Valence, then “Dematerialized: A New Contemporary Vision” took place in London, a show continuing the exploration of a new vision of reality that would appear to be devoid of its materiality. During the same year, the two artists participated in three collective exhibitions: “Brutal” and “Fresh Paint” in London, as well as “Wonderworks” in Hong-Kong.
ar to be devoid of its materiality. During the same year, the two artists participated in three collective exhibitions: “Brutal” and “Fresh Paint” in London, as well as “Wonderworks” in Hong-Kong.
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The two brothers kept on traveling, moving from Los Angeles in 2014 to Miami and even Colombia in 2015 for their show “Timeless”, a continuation of the “Antimatter series”. With portraiture, their signature technique involving the use of aerosol paint is very much recognizable. We seem to be able to tell the faces hidden in the mist… but no one will ever fully discern them. That same year, the artists also joined a group exhibition in Istanbul, Turkey.
In 2017 the exhibition “Hazy State of Affairs” took place in Milan, followed closely in 2018 by “Anonymous” in London, which presented sixteen airbrushed, blurry portraits. The show was about proposing to the public an experience grounded in memory as much as the visual sense, “to compel the viewer to recognize and re-establish the limits of his or her own perception, to regain control of the real.” The same year, they held another two solo exhibitions: “Time is now”, then “Boundless”, in Miami, which focused on female figures.
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Miaz Brothers, The Astronomer, 2020
The Miaz Brothers gradually extended their practice to other mediums, including sculpture. Their sculpted works remind us of their paintings: they too are blurred, melted portraits. Here again, imitation is not the desired effect. The point lies in playing with the phenomenon of perception. It is about “dematerializing the lines”.
Voluntarily leaving aside any notion of certainty, any attempt at "hyperrealism" or "clear lines", the two brothers understand the idea of "perception" in a new way, pointing to other realities to be discovered. Critic Louis Perez Pont even speaks of a “self-revolution”.
The artists thus question the "transitory nature of existence". Within an eminently intimate experience, the viewer is engaged in a game of deciphering and decoding information. A face-to-face encounter with oneself where everyone is conducting his own investigation. In this game, nothing is certain anymore. It is about doubting, and the viewer is led by the artists to question the very nature of the reality that surrounds us: what is reality? Does it actually exist in and by itself, or is it only a mental and subjective construct?
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The Hazy Reality of The New World - Shanghai,
