Giovanni Motta (@mottagiovanni) is a contemporary Italian artist. He began his artistic career painting with hyperrealist technique scenes of life extrapolated from his travels worldwide. After several exhibitions worldwide, In November 2020, he approaches Crypto Art, a new artistic current where everything is still to be built. It is possible to rewrite the history of art and begins to drop his crypto works on SuperRare.co portal.
With his unique style, Giovanni Motta opens a doorway to the inner child in the imagination of the beholder. When we ask him about his inspirations, he answers, “My beloved Valentina, my two sons Massimiliano and Ottaviano, the beauty of nature, walks on the beach, and the joy of living.” Glimpses of the childhood memories meet the eye with the touch of Japanese manga styles and help the artist reflect the inner child onto his mediums. To talk more about his art and fashion, Motta joined us for an interview.
“Wondermood”, 2020
Acrylic on canvas, screen printing 120 x 100 cm
Hi, Giovanni. First of all, thank you for your time doing this interview. You have a unique sense of the inner child in your artworks. You use styles of Japanese manga to reach a certain level of intimacy. What’s the difference between the world of anime and Japanese manga and traditional techniques when it comes to painting? What kind of a door does it open to you? Do you feel that it gives you a more expansive space for means of expression?
There is a profound cultural distance between the two worlds. Western and Eastern history, society, and customs are practically antithetic.
Painting is generally a tool that the artist studies. They learn to master and, with the passage of time, application, exercise, and inner reflection, tell stories, deepen the states of mind, transfer emotions and describe the contemporary world with a style that overtime should become increasingly personal and authentic.
So, the significant cultural differences with painting lead the two worlds not to be so far apart. An artist is also a human with his moods, life, passions, and loves. The world of Japanese anime and manga entered my life when I was a child and has strongly influenced my entire life.
Afternoons spent in front of cartoons and Sundays reading manga turned into unforgettable memories. They are still colorful emotions to this day that have not been dulled by time. Accessing these emotions whenever I desire through meditation allows me to enter my fantasy world and represent it.
What is the contribution of hyperrealism to your artworks? What does it mean to you?
Hyperrealism is fundamental to my work because it allows me to represent precisely the ideas that come to me all the time.
“Hyperrealism is my salvation. My mind keeps moving, thinking, reflecting. I can only stop it with meditation, which brings me great inner peace. After meditation, the sharpest images remain the ones that have survived. I begin to draw and sketch to fix them on paper, and then, with hyperrealist painting, I represent them, and in seeing them materialize, I feel an infinite joy.”
“Thanks”, 2020
Acrylic on canvas, screen printing 140 x 110 cm
Do you think the world of anime and Japanese manga helps you access the “inner child” or reflect it in your paintings?
Of course! My interest in anime and manga is related to the aesthetics, the stories, and the protagonists presented.
My connection is emotional, nostalgic, and sentimental. Every human being builds their inner structure in the period of childhood and puberty. Everything happens, and my education life was accomplished thanks to Lupin III, Amuro Ray, Haran Banjo, Goemon, Jigen, Ken Falco, Candy, Captain Harlock, Goku, Ikari, Lamu, Conan, Miwa, etc.
This endless tangle of emotions and memories ends up inside my paintings. It’s continuous contamination between past and present.
“I am interested in the recovery of lost emotional states related to events that have happened. Emotions generated by recollection have a peak of intensity. They were experienced in a place and at a precise moment in life. The places have delivered a form to the emotional states and help complete the idea of the memory. I make sculptures, paintings, and crypto works. I use 3d printing, clay modeling, and layered resins. I paint with acrylic paints on canvas and strive for perfection in the application of color.”
“The Fate of the Brave Child”, 2018 Acrylic on wood
184 x 184 cm
Could you further explain Crypto Art? How is it possible to rewrite the history of art with crypto works?
Crypto art is a new artistic current, a new world coming and will overwhelm the way of art.
A digital file can be unique, certified by the Blockchain, and become an NFT, a not fungible token. An impressive work of art, like a handmade painting or a sculpture.
The collector can buy a file that can be replicated and copied from today, but it can never be the certified one.
Pioneer artists of this new world such as Hackatao, Beeple, and Pak have marked a new territory’s boundaries to explore. They have sown and nurtured from underneath a vast field, which is now about to sprout and blossom.
Every child who wants to open up to art will do so with a pencil or a brush from now on. However, with an optical pen, it will do so, which marks the beginning of an incredible new artistic era. The traditional becomes the past, and the innovative becomes the present.
What differs when you change the mediums? For example, how is it different creating oil paintings or working on canvas from using 3D printing? Which one do you prefer better? Why?
Great question. I am 49 years old, but in reality, I am still a child because I live looking for joy in everything I do.
For me, there is no difference. It is all about learning how to use a new technique or tool.The differences are enormous, but not for me. My interest is only in the image, which is of immense value.
My goal is only and exclusively to create an image that represents what I feel and that allows anyone to get in touch with their inner child. I can use the oil technique, the pencil or the digital chisel, or the optical pen. There is no difference at all.
I try to learn how to use the tool as best as possible to get to the point of creating the image in my head and heart.
The tool I prefer is the one that allows me, from time to time, to be able to play and have fun while I realize and concretize the work.
Thank you for giving me extra time for this interview.
Thanks.
