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| Gerasim |
“What ace! a juxtaposition of your flowing silky hair with hints of your bare shoulders, with a look I cannot fathom on your face. Kindness, boredom, serious, aroused? Damo, I think I am barely scratching the surface of your complexity which combined so beautifully with your sexual nature!”
~ Peter Togni (Yale University)
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“Spirit rising.”
~ John Felice Ceprano (Ottawa rock sculptor, painter)
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“A most significant name for this lovely portrait.”
~ Kenneth Radu (Canadian writer)
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“Unfiltered Silence – Capturing the calm, introspective moment. Thoughts are endless.”
~ Rosie S. (Administrative Management, Vanier College)
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"When Macri offers a head without hat, covering or ornamentation, the hair often acts the role of symbolic hat and conveys meaning in ways similar to that of a carefully chosen hat. This is evident, for example, in the sensitive portrait Gerasim, or in the study of the divided brain in Latent Corpus Callosum Discernment, or in the narratively ladened and disconcerting work Cursive Penmanship and the Misfortunes of Virtue, and certainly in the hatless, ready-to-rumble, provocative series Night. Lest I lose my hat, I return to the matter at hand. There are many appearances of the toque and cowl in Macri’s art. I suspect it has something to do with manipulation and plasticity, texture and structure, allowing the artist to arrange and adjust to achieve an effect so necessary to the portrait that it cannot be complete without it."
~ Kenneth Radu (A Man of Many Hats: Macri's Millinery Motif)
“As Macri’s Gerasim looms towards me, swerves, and turns aside, I see that the artist combines both the spiritual and sexual in his rendition of the saintly saviour. Notice the length of beautiful, earth-brown hair, suggesting peasant origins, as well the bare shoulders and arms wrapped around a pillow, perhaps in bed, not alone, either pre or postcoital, certainly sexually suggestive. And the light! The off-white hue of the walls and pillow, the light skin tones of the upper arms and shoulders, the inexpressive or neutral look of the face with sharply etched lips and nostrils, the shape of the former corresponding with the shape of the latter, the precise cut of the beard: all contribute to an aura of gentleness and erotic compassion.”
~ Kenneth Radu (In My Dark Gallery: Recent Adamo Macri Portraits)
Gerasim, 2024
Photography: Chromogenic C-print
61 x 56 cm
