Mati Russo Gallery

“The art here is an amalgamation of work and life over recent years. The work itself reflects inspiration and innovation from an enthusiastic attitude I walk with through my life. The work utilizes a process both intellectual and technical moving from literal representation toward abstraction. Usually texture serves as the foundation for a painting or series. Within this foundation I begin to feel a focal point from which abstracted image and form emerges. The paintings are created slowly, built up over weeks texture

About Mati Russo - Abstract Artist

upon texture, evolving into multi-colored, multi-layered and multi-dimensional works. The texture begins with the feelings I am experiencing at that moment. Then I fill the canvas with color implied by my emotions. I apply the paint with brushes, sticks, cloth or my hands, painting, sanding, scratching, scraping splattering and spraying until the painting is born.

I enjoy the process of building the work as much as the finished work itself. I love as new textures and layers evolve, adding, taking away and adding all over again. Some of the work utilizes different media such as nuts and bolts, steel and glass, thread and wire... anything that grabs my attention can find its own intention in my art. It seems to me the work, the art and myself are building an intimate relationship, reaching deeper and discovering more about ourselves as the work progresses. And in the end the work finds a new beginning through its creation and through the experience the viewer takes from it, again and again and again...

What is abstract art?
For me it is the expression of ideas, emotion, time and space which are born in the heart and mind of the artist rather than the physical world, then through the hands of the artist given birth into the physical world.” -Mati Russo