Background
Valerio Adami was born on March 17, 1935 in Bologna, Italy.
Valerio Adami was born on March 17, 1935 in Bologna, Italy.
Initially, in 1945, Valerio began to study painting under the instruction of Felice Carena. Some time later, in 1951, he enrolled at Brera Academy, graduating in 1954. The following year, Adami moved to Paris, where he was influenced by Roberto Matta and Wifredo Lam.
Valerio Adami started his career with his first exhibition in Milan in 1959. Initially, his works were expressionistic, but by the time of his second exhibition in 1964 in Kassel, the painter had developed a style of painting reminiscent of French cloisonnism, featuring regions of flat color bordered by black lines.
Since the 1970s, Valerio started to address politics in his art and incorporated subject matter, such as modern European history, literature, philosophy and mythology. Also, during the 1970s, Adami made portraits of famous people, including James Joyce, Sigmund Freud and Gustav Mahler, and painted historical events, such as the French Revolution.
In 1971, Valerio collaborated with his brother Gioncarlo on the creation of the film "Vacances dans le désert". Three years later, he illustrated the poem "Occasional Poem No. 27. Ten Lessons on the Reich", which was written by Helmut Heissenbuttel.
In 1981, Valerio Adami was commissioned to create a large ceramic wall for the École nationale supérieure d'arts de Paris-Cergy in Cergy-Pontoise. Four years later, in 1985, Valerio took part in Paris Biennale.
During the period from 1985 to 1998, four retrospective exhibits of Adami's work were held in Paris, Tel Aviv and Buenos Aires.
Also, between 1993-1994, the painter created four monumental paintings for The Prince Park Tower Tokyo.
Since 2004, the Galerie Daniel Templon has represented Adami in Europe.
In 2010, Adami's paintings and drawings were exhibited at Boca Raton Museum of Art.
Quotations:
"I try to record coldly. My hand should be a kind of seismograph giving body to the traces left by the circuit of the imagination."
"Before a painting one must see something other than what one knows already. Associations and significances mingle together beyond the palette."
"We follow the line of a contour from its nervous system to the exaltation of the author."
Valerio Adami married Camilla Adami, a painter, in 1962.