Biography

Christina Gschwantner is an Austrian painter and illustrator, born in 1975 in Vienna, the city where she lives and works. You studied painting and graphics at the Vienna University of Applied Arts, graduating in 2001. Since 2003 you have worked as an independent artist. She loves to travel to savour the culture and vibes of places and people, drawing inspiration for her work. She has been in Greece, New York, Mexico, Australia for a year and most recently in Myanmar for 5 weeks. You have received scholarships from the Sussmann Foundation and the Vienna University of Applied Arts. In addition to her exhibition activities, she has been represented in several art fairs such as ART AUSTRIA, ART VIENNA and Parallel Vienna. Her art is inspired by a phrase by Serge Poliakoff: “Don’t teach drawing, teach life”, her creative process is in fact closely linked to life experience.

Philosophy

She has always been looking for the perfect shape. Her artistic methodology is based on a reconfiguration of form, the metamorphosis of the visible and a process of interpretation according to an approach in continuous variation and evolution. Her way of working is playful: “As a child I was lying in my grandmother’s bed, observing the walls, finding characters, creatures and beings. This is what I am still doing. My playful way of working is much more than a pictorial strategy. For me it is the opportunity to approach the world with curious amazement and enthusiastic commitment. By observing what appears, continually reinterpreting, finding something new, my art is placed on the borderline between fantasy and humor”. Painting is her passion, a way to share thoughts and emotions to be elaborated with canvases and colours. Some of her works appear wild, while others are more meditative, in a kind of play and confrontation.

Artwork in Castagno

Tracce dorate (Golden traces in English) by Christina Gschwantner is an artistic project that takes its cue from the chestnut stones, the stone walls and houses, with the aim of emphasizing their uniqueness and beauty.

The first part unfolds as a path that from the village of Castagno takes us outside, up to Casa Paloscia in La Vigna, in the new extension of the artistic path of the Borgo Museo: small golden footprints to look for, 25 stones in addition to the cracks of the small church of the Borgo. The material used to create this effect is a metallic gold leaf. The artist has deliberately chosen this color because she, in her opinion, expresses the idea of ​​something ancient and precious, as well as sacred, culturally perceived in this way by everyone, including children. Ancient, like the past history of the town that Christina wanted to highlight, as a tribute to the village. These traces, in the artist’s idea, are not made to remain but to show the passage of time and if it happens to disappear, as part of the history of stones, the chestnut stones that have struck her so much:

“When I saw Castagno’s photos for the first time, I immediately fell in love with the stones of which the walls, houses and buildings are made. I was magically drawn to their perfect harmony and simplicity, their variety and perfection and all the different shapes. I fell in love with the details and small traces of this ancient place. A place that obviously has a long history to tell and where it is still possible to perceive the history of an ancient living community with so much art and life going on. But it is also a place that has now become very quiet and the best of it – its GOLDEN days – are long gone. With my project I wanted to pay homage to the beauty of the old, but also to make a gift to the town itself, creating awareness for some very beautiful small details that can be found in this special place”.

Along the way, therefore, you come across small stones and pieces by chance, golden traces to pay attention to. The stitches chosen are meant to be very subtle and discreet, and often not visible at first glance. Only after a more careful inspection or a certain incidence of light, can they be perceived and seen, thanks to the shimmer of light emanating from the gold-coloured leaf. These are therefore small details scattered here and there, inside and outside the town and in the surrounding areas, fragments to which the artist wanted to instill new attention, thus adding a further layer to the history of the old stones, in the idea of ​​expanding not only the environment but to create a network of “little golden relics that want to be discovered and appreciated by their viewer, little treasures to enjoy”.

A more substantial intervention was then carried out on the rear corner of the village church, again in gold, with a reference to the sacredness of religious places. The artist wanted to create a mural that connected the old and the new. In fact, the church appeared to Christina as the true heart of Castagno. As a reference to the connection he has chosen to re-propose a stone form present in the house of Seccheto where he spent his Artist’s Residence, with the aim of creating a connection between the old and the new, the past and the present, creating yes something new, but also including what has already been there for a long time.

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