Rudy Cremonini and His Decadent Scenes at Capsule Shanghai

Bodies laid out on a couch in a detached and clumsy way; ladies sipping a drink; a table with two whole pineapples; floral compositions but also bathers in a pool, flamingoes immersed in a garden with statues and luxurious plants - these are the protagonists of the paintings of Rudy Cremonini, artist from Bologna with his first monographic exhibition in China. The works, inspired by daily life and the often meaningless minutiae that occupy it, are marked by a vein of melancholy and a sense of decadence. The title of the exhibition itself evokes the moment in which stupor, joy, emotion and enthusiasm make way for a reality with nothing sublime but rife with banality. Paintings which, behind apparent calm and rationality, hide soothing, sedate, domesticated emotions which are incapable of free expression. The works, often dashed off quite deliberately by the artist, evidence the urgency to place on the canvas what will surely be swept away by history and its penchant for grand narratives.