Art & Design APRIL 2018 : ISSUE 83
Ahead of its Time AIR
Loyal to the fabrics and philosophy of a bygone age, Christian Tagliavini creates detailed scenes authentically rooted in the Renaissance WORDS: CHRIS UJMA
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atch the subjects’ gaze and drink in their elaborate garb. You’re certain this is a picture from a bygone era, and it’s natural to cast one’s imagination back to a time when the scene would have been something of a normality. Imagining 15 th century Florence, for instance, with each brushstroke being carefully applied to canvas as the artist works by candlelight, sounds of gaiety echoing along cobbled strada outside. That’s the intention. But Christian Tagliavini’s elaborately replicated scenes are captured on camera, closer in history to Andrea Bocelli than Sandro Botticelli. The Renaissance was a cultural bridge between the primitive Middle Ages and modern civilisation, and Tagliavini’s modern interpretations of that time 34
feel like taking a gondola back up the Grand Canal, from the present to the past. Even Tagliavini’s Italian surname would not sound amiss among those of Italy’s golden art age, but he was actually born in 1971 in Switzerland, and raised in Parma, Italy. For each series of his mise-en-scène, he begins with a muse: the titles of each portraiture collection reference the birth year of an artist from that time. His most recent series, 1406, is inspired by Filippo Lippi, and harks back to the cultural and artistic mood of the Quattrocento; Lippi’s output includes the fresco-inspired Madonna and Child. Tagliavini’s breakthrough series, 1503, was named in homage to Agnolo di Cosimo – ‘Il Bronzino’, who produced the acclaimed Venus, Cupid, Folly and Time.
“I use the artist’s date of birth as a signifier to identify the period, and it serves as a tribute to the painters that first inspired the series,” shares Tagliavini. “I do reference other painters of the era when I’m producing a given series, however. But I will not reproduce a painting or do an historical reproduction. I only find inspiration.” The costumes and handcrafted props take months to make (and also to research, ensuring accuracy). The artist attends to each meticulous detail, and stays as true as possible to the fabrics and materials of the time. “For 1503 I was inspired by the fashion that appeared at the tail end of the period, composed of long necks, clean lines and less elements,” he elaborates. “1406 is inspired both by the clothing of the late middle ages, and also the
