Reception for "Mondoexpressionism" show at New Haven Public Library Saturday

New Haven Free Public Library Art Gallery
133 Elm St., New Haven
Elisa Vegliante: Mondoexpressionism
Aug. 6—Sept. 8, 2012.
Artist's reception: Sat., Aug. 11, 2—4 p.m.

Press release from Azoth Gallery

Welcome to the world of “Mondoexpressionism” a term created by artist Elisa Vegliante that can be roughly translated as "Beyond ‘The Scream.’" Reaching for words to describe her massive, iconoclastic body of work, clichés like "poignant", "provocative" and other recycled expletives are impotent and absurd.

Arty Fields of The Patterson Review of Art notes that by “combining the expressionism of Edvard Munch with the personal visual documentation of Frida Kahlo, Vegliante’s … [oil on canvas] paintings merge elements of inner psychology with events in the material world to form a haunting, disturbing, enlightening and completely unique body of work… Her paintings vividly illustrate the psychological and philosophical underpinnings of characters and events, the spiritual motivation behind things, rather than the things themselves. Her bold and shameless paintings make for an ongoing cultural diary of Western Civilization’s mass hysteria at the breaking point.”

Vegliante also stars in husband Ace Fronton’s backyard films as the eccentric actress, Yahuba Daley, such as in the astonishing (to this viewer), feature-length "Seven Ghastly Sins." These films, like Vegliante’s paintings, are multidimensional vignettes of psycho/social commentary in motion picture format, giving voice to another facet of the artist’s boundless creativity. A sampling of these video films will be shown at the artist's reception, August 11th.