Critical commentary by Lorena Gava:
The artistic universe of Massimiliana Sonego has reached a turning point.
After so many still lifes seen from the outside, through a punctual analysis of the objective data composed mainly of vases, flowers, and containers placed on simple but richly historic furniture surfaces, the artist comes to break the unity of vision with an eye cast inside the object itself, capable of bringing forth a different truth. It is as if the veil of appearances, first extraordinarily played on chromatic assonances, on perspective rationality, on the care of detail and decorative aspects, had been definitively lifted or even torn off in order to reveal a combination of hidden forms, a structural logic otherwise destined to remain silent or ignored.
There is a strong intention to discover an existential map far from the phenomenal being and centered instead on the irreverent play of parts: the object itself loses the certain connotations of spatial arrangement and undergoes the charm of deconstruction, of perspectival and compositional fragmentation. Hence, from the known reality made of chairs, sofas, furniture, boxes, only the perimeters or rather the skeletons remain, materializing into a memory made of gross, wide, articulated, and disarticulated lines in a labyrinthine play of geometric solutions. Quadrangular and elliptical forms, never regular, often crossed by a wave-like movement similar to weak shocks that make the whole unstable, take shape. The absence of a perspectival system, due to the declared will to arrange each single piece on the same plane, changes the sense of relationships: whether it is a vertical disposition or a horizontal alignment, the fascination of the vision arises from the unpredictable chance of the juxtapositions, where, however, nothing is left to chance. The strict logic of the parts prevails, which, although disjointed and dismembered, do not hesitate to gather together in unity, in a whole that takes into account, in equal measure, the large and the small.
The disassembled, enlarged, detached object becomes the subject of an unexpected reality that takes place on the surface without obstacles, in the fullness of a freedom finally achieved. A thin thread of white or black color often follows these disemboweled entities, in the intention, perhaps, of recognizing their original unity, a thread that deliberately contrasts with the underlying chromatic dimensions, almost like a seamstress thread that sews pieces of fabric.
The colors that Massimiliana Sonego uses are always refined, highly researched, following the repeated course of the objects and accompanying the scenic warp with a happy visual impact. Strokes of red, blue, and purple contrast with the grays of the backgrounds and animate the timbre recalls of the narrative. Sometimes the scene becomes more silent, absorbed, and the hues are attested around the delicate shades of pink pigments, similar to powder; other times, the chromatic violence becomes material and emerges from the background with sudden and protruding stratifications.
It is difficult to remain indifferent to these naked objects-subjects, defrauded of their usual being, but precisely for this reason worthy of the depth and intelligence of our gaze."
