Artists Biography
Anna Maria Rossi Zen
ANNAMARIA ROSSI ZEN was born in Adria near Venice, but has been living in Trento since her childhood. Her early art vocation was from the beginning a primary objective, and one to receive her full commitment. She studied at the Academy of Fine Arts in Verona, engraving and experimental techniques in Venice and applied art in Urbino. She also spent a period of study at the Künstlerhaus in Salzburg.
In the ‘60s and ‘70s she painted her canvas true to life, en plein air, using oil paints, experiencing a real emotional communication with nature.
On the wake of the figurative experiences of the “Macchiaioli” and post-impressionist painters, she drew her inspiration from two forms of landscape: the Trentino mountains, the enchantment and magic colours that captured her from the start, and the Po valley, steeped in misty atmospheres still deep in her heart.
In the ‘80s she reached new technical and expressive frontiers as she transferred her favourite themes to plexiglas, glass and raku ceramics.
In the ‘90s, in a dynamic equilibrium of vertical rhythms, closed up fronts loom up aggressively, invading the whole canvas and coming to the viewer with a language of signs and colours in a continuously changing chiaro-scuro that banishes nature to the sides.
The brush does not run on the materic surface to describe, but to evoke, with worn and ginned details reminding of some informal painting, where life’s frenzy is caught in a flash.
Since 1996 the tone range has recovered the original colours and, with renewed expressive vigour, shows a deeply felt recapturing of initial stimuli: reality relived and reworked through sentimental memory.
An intense exhibiting activity has seen her present at the most important national and international art exhibitions, winning significant first prizes and many other awards.
She was repeatedly present at Expo Arte in Bari, at Arte Fiera in Bologna, Padova and Vicenza, at Art Box in Carpi, at Umbria ExpoArte in Bastia Umbra Perugia, at Miart in Milan, at Art Jonction in Cannes, at VineArt in Bozen, at Internationale Kunstmesse and Lange Nacht der Museen in Innsbruck, at Meeting of Rimini.
Many are the collective exhibitions held in Italy and abroad: Brussels, Marcinelle, Charleroi, Mechelen, Diegem (Belgium); Luxemburg; Amersfoort (Netherlands); lnnsbruck, Lienz, Volders Tirol, Vienna (Austria); Berlin, Nuremberg, Kempten (Germany); Cannes (France); San Sebastian (Spain); Galway, Dublin, Punchestown (Ireland); Santiago, La Serena, Valparaiso (Chile); Belo Horizonte (Brazil); Rosario (Argentina); Hermosillo, Caborca, Ciudad Obregon, Nogales, Alamos, Magdalena de Chino and Universidad de Sonora (Mexico); Tucson, Arizona (United States); Asunçion (Paraguay).
In 1993 she was invited to talk about her journey in art at a Seminar held at the Galleria Civica d’Arte Contemporanea in Trento on the subject of “Contemporary Art Perspectives and Research in Trentino”.
In 1995 she obtained the coveted Adria’s Rotary Club award, with a large anthological exhibition being held in her native town.
In 1999 she received the award of the President of the Italian Republic, Carlo Azeglio Ciampi.
In 2003 she was invited at MART of Rovereto for the exhibition: “Situazioni. Trentino Arte 2003” and at Palazzo Trentini of Trento for: “Arte Trentina del Novecento”.
Long is the list of personal exhibitions set up in important private galleries and prestigious public institutions in Italy and abroad. In these last years significant anthological exhibitions were held at the Galleria Fedrizzi (Cles -Trento), at Galleria Maestri (Adria), at Galleria Schafferer (Innsbruk – Austria), at Galleria Il Castello (Trento) and at Solo Arte Gallery (Waterford – Ireland).
The artist also illustrated a number of poetry and fiction texts.
Her work is described in a number of critiques, contained in two monographs, published in 1993 by Giovanna Nicoletti and in 1999 by Maurizio Scudiero and Renzo Francescotti.
Documentation about the artist’s work can be found at the Historical Archives of the Venice Biennale and at the Archives of Contemporary Art of Trento and Rovereto.
