Mattia Barbieri (Brescia, 1985). In his painting practice the vertical tension, or that necessary need for transcending, is immediate. Through a decisive technical skill connoted by the richness of elements, in the artist's works the planes are mixed and enriched with characters and structures drawn from the history of art, from tarot cards, from mysticisms of the most diverse origins, to flow into a new lexical code in which everything is combined in a constant need for elevation. The dual soul of the artist emerges with virulent force: the meditative and quiet aspect clashes with destructive restlessness. Thus it is that in his skillful paintings are interspersed with hammering, drill carvings, and colors with violent strokes that interrupt the sacredness of the gesture to unite it with human dynamics, where the unpredictable panders to its mystery. A graduate of the Brera Academy of Fine Arts, he has exhibited in solo and group shows in Italy and abroad since 2007. He participated in the Moscow Biennial at the Winzavod Contemporary Art Center in 2010; in 2012 he won the First Painting Prize of the Museum of Lissone; during Expo Milano 2015 he collaborated with Progetto Città Ideale, exhibiting and curating a series of art events at the Sala delle Colonne of the Fabbrica del Vapore in Milan; in 2017 and 2019 solo exhibitions at Pablo's Birthday Gallery in NewYork; in 2020 he won the Nocivelli Prize. Lives and works between Milan and New York