Enzina Fuschini – artist and adventurer in exploring lifestyle objects

Written by Tom Roberts
6 April 2013

On Fuschini

Born in the tiny village of Matierno in Southern Italy, Fuschini studied at the Art Institute of Salerno where she specialised for her Masters Degree in lithography, etching and ceramic techniques. She also worked on mosaic and fresco restoration at the Sovraintendenza delle Belle Arti di Roma. Her first solo exhibition took place in Milan at the age of twenty. Shortly afterwards she met Giorgio de Chirico, the famous surrealist painter, who expressed great respect for her work and included her work in his private collection. In 1978 she received an Honorary Master of Arts degree from Florence Academy. Fuschini moved to Paris in the early Eighties, became a Member of the Société des Artistes Française, and a contributor to the Grand Palais Exhibition. There were solo exhibitions in Genoa and Paris, and her work was exhibited at the National Library in Paris. In the late Eighties she moved to New York, exhibiting there, and presenting a solo exhibition in Rome to mark the centennial of the birth of de Chirico.

The Nineties brought Enzina to London with a variety of solo exhibitions. However, during this time she also began exploring ways of extending her work on to porcelain, dismantling the barriers between ‘fine art’ and ‘applied art’. She had recognised that what she had to say could be communicated through objects of everyday life and not just through framed pictures kept at a distance on walls. Moving with her family to Sandbanks in the new Millennium has opened up a new chapter in freeing up her creative spirit. Work ranges from powerful paintings (the ‘Beauty for Ashes’ series based on the theme of September 11th, and ‘Turning Point’ - a series recognising the changes in her own life) to recently commissioned bespoke porcelain designs for Harrods. The Dorchester has followed suit with a commission to commemorate its seventy-fifth year in London through unique designs on porcelain. Art, business, lifestyle and globally important contemporary messages are intermingling in new exciting forms of expression.

A dream of art and design

In true Italian style, Fuschini peels away the tension between ‘fine art’ and ‘crafts’. The Alessi family turn domestic objects into contemporary art icons by introducing poetry, creativity, culture, and vision – but in their case the starting point is the craftsman. Fuschini starts from the position of celebrated fine artist, but with the same capacity for poetry, creativity, culture, wit and vision enthusiastically exploring materials as part of her tools of communication.

Her work is full of hope, love, vibrant colour, transparency and child-like (not childish) imagery communicating often deeply serious messages – issues of global significance, issues approached from the conviction of someone with immense Christian faith.

Enzina’s art is inspired by the restless energies of the 21st century. Beauty for Ashes is a series of paintings based upon journalist’s images of September 11th. Painted soon after the event, the message she conveys is one of hope rather than despair for mankind. The heroic work can be compared with Picasso’s ‘Guernica’. The Turning Point series is based on the theme of change. To be alive is to go through change, and to go on going through change. Change is about moving from here to there, about choosing paths and following directions. It is about life and the future of the planet as much as it is about the trivia of daily routine. Change can be measured against yardsticks – principles that do not change. Many of the images in the Turning Point series focus on everyday objects – glasses, jugs, pots vases – ‘static’ objects which are in fact, full of movement and strangely symbolise the human dilemma. Colours are fresh, beautiful and vibrant; lines and shapes become physical landscapes and landscapes of the mind. The vitality and wit seen in Picasso, Matisse, Klee, Miro and Kandinsky is also evident in these images.

It is interesting that Fuschini’s preoccupation with everyday objects as symbols in her paintings are now turned inside out and the ‘canvas’ for her paintings becomes the objects - the porcelain, fashions and furniture of real life.

For example the Blue Lady began as a painting in the Turning Point series. She is a natural beauty who knows who she is and does not need to pretend to be an actress or a model to gain respect. She has found the truth in life. The beautifully simple picture with all the strength, directness and humanity of Matisse reappears on a piece of porcelain or fabric design. The image is not devalued but strengthened; a surrealist game may be in play here, with subject and object being cleverly reversed, and the human being weaves between them. This is an intriguing statement on life and lifestyle today.

Fuschini explores multiple layers of meaning in the Seventy Fifth Anniversary porcelain commission for The Dorchester. On one level she is fascinated, as an experienced restorer, in the Art Deco origins of the hotel. She requested The Dorchester to allow her to develop the design working in one of the most atmospheric rooms of the building. The final design clearly picks up the motifs, colours and shapes of the period, but what of the future? Fuschini felt that the future for The Dorchester is one of ambassador bringing together nations and the cultures of East and West. The focus of her design therefore becomes a shaft of light from a diamond, not just bridging past with future but East and West. What more powerful and relevant vision could one have?

Selling objects

Fuschini is not just a painter who occasionally paints or prints on objects, any more than Harrods is just a company which sells objects. Both are engaged in exploring the mysterious process of selling and understanding objects as symbols of the mood and culture of our society and both are in tune with public mood. Others see objects as part of a world that exists to be used and destroyed. There are always two ways of looking at things.