Quarantine Drawings by Antonio Riello

Quarantine Drawings

Antonio Riello’s Quarantine drawings are a very personal and tormented reportage of a kitchen landscape. He started an obsessive production of a catalogue around kitchen tools and objects. Just humble sketches of course but, all together, they would become a great “Visual Dictionary of Quarantine”, a sort of Late-Modern as well as Enlightenment Encyclopedia. Work in progress at a weird time but also a devoted homage to beloved Alberto Giacometti and his drawing style. The taxonomic classification of every “creature” also shows Riello’s passion for Mark Dion’s research, the main idea is to create an Anthropological Museum of culinary ergonomy and cruelty.

All the drawings are completely made by blue pen (BIC) ink (the same one Alighiero Boetti loved so much to use) on humble paper (A3 size). The artist believes we need “ordinary” tools to be able to imagine “extraordinary”
adventures.

Credits: Antonio Riello. Commissioned by Open Space.
Credits: Antonio Riello. Commissioned by Open Space.

Born under the sign of Leo in Venice (Italy), Antonio Riello currently lives and works in London.

Riello is an eclectic, experimental artist, working with mediums such as painting, sculpture, design, photography, installation and video games. Exploring the irony of conceptual charade, Riello manipulates and almost mistreats the objects and images he invents.

He is committed to exploring the most topical and controversial issues, especially the so-called “forbiddenness” of contemporary Western society. A controlled and varied degree of ambiguity is a significant element of his research.