Above: Portrait of Gabriela Sobanska, oil on canvas, 15 x 11 in. (2010)
Portraits & Illustrations:
Sanguine Pencil--Oil on Canvas & Panel--Watercolour--Sketches & Charcoal
Sanguine Pencil--Oil on Canvas & Panel--Watercolour--Sketches & Charcoal
For the Love of Portraiture
"To paint a portrait, I can only succeed if I perceive that I have a good, profound, loyal person in front of me. I could never portray a villain. When I portray characters from the past with my "Limoges blue" monochrome technique, I choose characters I admire, or writers or artists whose lives have impressed me favourably. For the study of lights and chiaroscuro, besides the ancient masters, I think it is essential to admire the old masterpieces of cinema in black and white."--Gabriele Reina
"To paint a portrait, I can only succeed if I perceive that I have a good, profound, loyal person in front of me. I could never portray a villain. When I portray characters from the past with my "Limoges blue" monochrome technique, I choose characters I admire, or writers or artists whose lives have impressed me favourably. For the study of lights and chiaroscuro, besides the ancient masters, I think it is essential to admire the old masterpieces of cinema in black and white."--Gabriele Reina
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The Sanguine Technique
"I love the sanguine pencil because it was the basis of the Renaissance: any masterpiece, before becoming concrete, began with a drawing with this technique of light and volumes. Landscapes and especially portraits drawn in sanguine have a very intense visual impact because you can "demonstrate what the figure has in the soul" (Leonardo). A human face seems to emerge from the paper as the reddish hue gives it a surprising chiaroscuro. If well done, it conveys a more immediate emotion than the oil portrait."--GR
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Book Illustration
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From left: studies of John Maynard Keynes, Gustav Dore, and Sir Walter Scott
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 Ritratto di una principessa Radziwill. Olio su tavola, cm 128 x 72
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Portraiture: Oil and Watercolour
"The difference between a watercolour and an oil portrait is in the immediacy. The watercolour is light, fast, transparent, bright as a sunrise, it allows you to fix the personality and interiority of a visage more quickly. The oil is more meditative, more solemn, more "ceremonial". Often a watercolour sketch is more suggestive than the final oil portrait, even if by painting "alla prima" one can achieve the results of the watercolour. --GR 
Study after Tamara de Lempicka's 1929, "Self-Portrait in a Green Bugatti"
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Izabela Potocka (1864-1883).
Olio su tavola,
128 x 72 cm
Ritratto di Hedy Lamarr
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Ritratto di Gabriela Sobanska, 15 x 11 in
Study after Sir John Everett Millais
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Portrait "unfinished" of Joan of Arc
Ritratto di Tamara de Lempicka
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Watercolours
"My concept of painting is the same of Renaissance craftsman, when you conquered technical ability by means of a loving and tenacious application. First of all painting is a vocation: to use the rules learned from the masters, try and try again, improving yourself with constant exercise. Genius, ability to give life to colour on canvas it is another story. For me, drawing is an instrument of knowledge. As in our life we learn through continuous comparisons, I like to prove by logical comparisons how contemporary art is devoid of interest. If by spell a portrait by Titian were turned into a music, food, architecture, poem, or car, it probably would become a symphony by Vivaldi, a gourmandise by Vatel, a palace of the fairies, a hymn of Homer, a Ferrari car. Now, I wonder what would a doodle by Mirò or a canvas by Fontana be transformed into? People should put to themselves this riddle and learn how to use more objectively their minds."
--Gabriele Reina
"My concept of painting is the same of Renaissance craftsman, when you conquered technical ability by means of a loving and tenacious application. First of all painting is a vocation: to use the rules learned from the masters, try and try again, improving yourself with constant exercise. Genius, ability to give life to colour on canvas it is another story. For me, drawing is an instrument of knowledge. As in our life we learn through continuous comparisons, I like to prove by logical comparisons how contemporary art is devoid of interest. If by spell a portrait by Titian were turned into a music, food, architecture, poem, or car, it probably would become a symphony by Vivaldi, a gourmandise by Vatel, a palace of the fairies, a hymn of Homer, a Ferrari car. Now, I wonder what would a doodle by Mirò or a canvas by Fontana be transformed into? People should put to themselves this riddle and learn how to use more objectively their minds."
--Gabriele Reina
Left: Scene Inpired by John Keats, watercolor
"Thou wast not born for death, immortal Bird!
No hungry generations tread thee down
The voice I hear this passing night was heard
In ancient days by emperor and clown
Perhaps the self-same song that found a path
Through the sad heart of Ruth, when, sick for home,
She stood in tears among the alien corn..."
--Ode to a Nightingale (1819)
"Thou wast not born for death, immortal Bird!
No hungry generations tread thee down
The voice I hear this passing night was heard
In ancient days by emperor and clown
Perhaps the self-same song that found a path
Through the sad heart of Ruth, when, sick for home,
She stood in tears among the alien corn..."
--Ode to a Nightingale (1819)
Studies from the 'Palio di Siena'--The Panther Contrada
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Sketches & Charcoal
"Drawing is very difficult because it requires perseverance, exercises, and a huge diligence. It is like to take care of a vineyard; you must look after it every day. Just by sketching, constantly drawing, practicing every day the artist is able to improve the eye, learning how it is essential that you understand where and how is a dashed line[...]Unfortunately, drawing is a dead language like Latin, now. Drawing was killed by photography, which mechanically replicate copies of forms and shadows that speak to the eye but not the soul. So, today, very few people are able to read that language, and even less to write it. It must be remembered that the Greek word techné means “technical”, meaning “art”. I like to recall a modern painter, Giorgio De Chirico, who wrote that “before being able to paint like Cézanne, Picasso, Soutine, Matisse, before you could have the emotion, anxiety, sincerity, sensitivity, spontaneity, spirituality, you’d better learn to cut a beautiful and good point to your pencil and then you should try to draw a good eye, a nose, a mouth or an ear”. "
--Gabriele Reina
"Drawing is very difficult because it requires perseverance, exercises, and a huge diligence. It is like to take care of a vineyard; you must look after it every day. Just by sketching, constantly drawing, practicing every day the artist is able to improve the eye, learning how it is essential that you understand where and how is a dashed line[...]Unfortunately, drawing is a dead language like Latin, now. Drawing was killed by photography, which mechanically replicate copies of forms and shadows that speak to the eye but not the soul. So, today, very few people are able to read that language, and even less to write it. It must be remembered that the Greek word techné means “technical”, meaning “art”. I like to recall a modern painter, Giorgio De Chirico, who wrote that “before being able to paint like Cézanne, Picasso, Soutine, Matisse, before you could have the emotion, anxiety, sincerity, sensitivity, spontaneity, spirituality, you’d better learn to cut a beautiful and good point to your pencil and then you should try to draw a good eye, a nose, a mouth or an ear”. "
--Gabriele Reina
Dr. Albert Schweitzer
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General George Patton
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