BIOGRAPHY
By researching the themes of popular culture with both ancient techniques, using wood, and contemporary ones, combining wood with industrial resins, Massimo Sansavini has created a unique style that blurs between craftsmanship and contemporary art.
His work first attracted attention in the late 1990s, when Fabio Maghalaes curator of the MASP in São Paulo and curator of the Mercosul Biennial invited him to stay in Brazil.
The Brazilian period, which lasted three years, greatly influenced the artist’s work, linking his works to nature, animism and colour, choosing subjects charged with cultural connotations.
Sansavini’s vocabulary ranges from the cryptic to the cute, walking a fine line between nostalgic cliché and emotional archetype.
Seduced by his infinitely detailed, meticulously polished and mirrored surfaces, the viewer is confronted with the juxtaposition of childhood innocence and the mysterious recesses of the soul.
A subtle thought inhabits his paintings; the work is a call to the deepest psychic that tends to make the childishness in us re-emerge, a rediscovery of a past hidden beneath the surface of cultural kitsch.
In Sansavini’s world, the spectator goes back in time to recover a forgotten past that is common to us all.
Massimo Sansavini has received several awards. His works have been exhibited in museums and galleries in Italy, Belgium, Germany, Finland, Russia, China and the United States.
He has recently created the exhibition “Touroperator” using the hulls of migrants. This exhibition has also been received at the European Parliament and has received the patronage of the President of the European Union, David Sassoli.
Massimo Sansavini currently lives and works in Forli, Italy.
Massimo Sansavini [Forlì 1961], after studying at the Academy of Fine Arts in Ravenna, he specialised in wood technology and the use of industrial resins applied to art.
In 1999, at the invitation of the director of the São Paulo Art Biennial, he spent three years in Brazil creating sculptures, which were exhibited at the Mu.B.E Museo Brasileiro da Escultura in São Paulo, the Italian Embassy in Brasilia, the MCE Museu in Porto Alegre and the Museu Nacional de Belas Artes in Rio de Janeiro, also at the behest of the architect Oscar Niemeyer, whom he met in Rio.
He has created various sets for RAI, including Paolo Fox’s horoscope, which has been on television for over 14 years.
In 2004 he took part in the Picasso to Botero exhibition curated by Vittorio Sgarbi and Giovanni Faccenda under the patronage of the President of the Republic.
In 2007 he created the Neverland travelling exhibition for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which was shown in Berlin, Hamburg, Wolfburg and Nuremberg, curated by Maurizio Vanni and Maurizio Sciaccaluga.
In 2009 he began working with Maison Enrico Coveri, for whom he created designs for fashion and design collections. He was also present in the exhibition on Futurism in Alessandria, where he created the roundabout in Via S. Giovanni Bosco.
In 2010 he was included in the exhibition “Road to Futurism” at the National Museum of China in Beijing and the Guangdong Art Museum in Canton, sponsored by the Presidency of the Council of Ministers and the Ministry of Cultural Activities.
He then exhibited in various museums in Italy, Germany, Russia, China, Finland and the United States.
Since 2013 he began to deal with social issues in particular the issue of migrants.
In 2015 he was able to access the former Loran military base in Lampedusa, with the exclusive authorisation of the Court of Agrigento, to take the hulls of migrants and create the Touroperator exhibition, which is now on display in 13 museums.
The Touroperator exhibition in April 2020 obtained the high Patronage of the European Parliament.
In 2021 he inaugurates the Rotonda dei Fiori a monumental public work on the outskirts of the city of Forli, the inauguration is accompanied by the exhibition Prima-Vera curated by Nadia Stefanel and hosted at the Fondazione Dino Zoli Arte Contemporanea, is on display at the Glance Art Studio gallery in Forli.
In 2022 he is on display at Art Luxury Gallery in Milan, and is then featured in the exhibition Tra Sogno e Realtà at the Galleria Comunale Leonardo Da Vinci in Cesenatico curated by Francesca Caldari.
In 2023 he makes the official mask of the Carnival of Gambettola (FC) he then makes the Pallio for the City of Carpineto Romano where a solo exhibition of his work is hosted. He continues the Touroperator Exhibition at the Maritime Museum of Cesenatico under the high patronage of the European Parliament. He is also present at the group exhibitions Riflessi d’Arte in Cava dè Tirreni (SA) and Arte Nel Palazzo in Maiori (SA).
Sansavini's work was covered
Valeria Arnaldi
Giuseppe Bonini
Daniela Brignone
Francesca Caldari
Mauro Corradini
Renato Cristin
Umberto Croppi
Alberto D’Atanasio
Philippe Daverio
Giovanni Faccenda
Paolo Fox
Massimo Galbiati
Francesco Gallo
Claudio Musso
Orlando Piraccini
Alessandra Redaelli
Alessandro Riva
Giulia Ronchi
Davide Rondoni
Maurizio Sciaccaluga
Vittorio Sgarbi
Luigi Tallarico
Tommaso Trini
Maurizio Vanni