About
Zino Pece
I studied photography at degree and postgraduate level, but painting has always been my real passion. Now devoting my time to making abstract art, I explore fresh possibilities and refute the suggestion that painting is dead. Painting has continued to break new ground, expand our vision and convey meaning.
Living in Wales, I am surrounded by some of the most beautiful scenery that I have seen anywhere in the world. It inspires me, not in a way that it would a landscape artist, but in its fluidity. The ever-changing colour, forms and light, shows me a creator’s world; one that is established, yet open to new variations, not through randomness, but through choices, choices which offer a clear message. This is my approach: the materials and methods represent a stable foundation from which to spontaneously respond. Guided by a demanding aesthetic and an open attitude, one places forms and colours and begins a process of observations, decisions, actions and risks, in the hope of arriving at a point of realisation.
Education
2005 – MA Photography, Swansea Metropolitan University ( University Of Wales ).
1999 – BA (Hons ) Photography In The Arts, Swansea Metropolitan University ( University Of Wales ).
1993 – HND in Design ( Photography ), Swansea Metropolitan University ( University Of Wales ).
1991 – Art Foundation Diploma, Nottingham.
Exhibitions
(Painting)
2014 Works currently on show at Indycube, Swansea and The Fletcher Gate Art Gallery, Nottingham.
2014 The Oxford International Art Fair.
2013/14 Winter Show at the Taliesin Arts Centre, Swansea. (Group)
2013 The Fletcher Gate Art Gallery, Nottingham. (Solo)
2012 Oriel Bach Gallery, Swansea. (Solo)
2011 The Brick Lane Gallery, London. (Group)
2011 Gallery at 94, London. (Solo)
2008 Ripples Cafe, Swansea. (Solo)
2007 The Glynn Vivian Museum and Art Gallery, Swansea. “Swansea Open” (Group)
2007 The Exposure Gallery, Swansea. “Recent Paintings” (Solo)
(Photography)
2006 Glyn Vivian Museum and Art Galley, Swansea, “Final Season At The Vetch” (Group)
2004 Glynn Vivian Museum and Art Gallery, Swansea, “Swansea Open” (Group)
2004 Brick Lane, London, “Show and Tell” (Group)
2004 Deffett Francis Gallery, Swansea, “MART” (Group)
1999 Cardiff Bay Arts Trust, “NCM Graduate Prize (Runner UP) (Group)
1999 The Association Gallery, London, “Student Awards” (Finalist) (Group)
1996/99 Ffotogallery, Cardiff, “Ffotoannual” (Group)
My Story
I can’t say that art has always been in my blood. There are no family connections and there were no childhood interests in painting, unless you can include ripping and scribbling on my bedroom wallpaper. Maybe these formative works were shaping a preference for the avante-garde?
My first day at school is remembered for being reduced to tears at the prospect of having to draw. We were given a piece of paper and pencil and asked to make a drawing, I didn’t know what to do, not much has changed.
It was not until my early teens, when I took up photography in school, that I remember becoming interested in art. At last I’d found something that excited me and I took to it quickly. Prior to this, pictures in books- be they photographic or illustrations fascinated me, but I didn’t know why. I just remember being more inclined to look at images in books and magazines rather than read the text and I would play the game of judging which images I liked best. I would also do this at home every year with Christmas cards. Looking back I can see how this relates to my visual sense, not only for the importance of training the eye, but it is also linked to my interest in aesthetics and the importance of making value judgments.
Other Information
Several of Zino Pece’s paintings are held in private collections.
Here is a statement that art critic Kenworth Moffett recently wrote about the work:
“In the last two years, the British painter, Zino Pece, has become one of the handful of painters who I think of as at the cutting edge of modern abstraction. Following in the footsteps of Jackson Pollock and Morris Louis, he orchestrates improvisational paint pouring on a large scale. Unlike his forebearers, he is able to exploit the unique properties of the new water based polymer paints to achieve the freedom and fluidity which he craves. Pece’s pictures freeze a spontaneous, yet perfect moment in the flow of paint.”
Kenworth Moffett Ph.D
October 2010
Art critic Kenworth Moffett was curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. He has organised numerous exhibitions and written monographs on several artists including Kenneth Noland and Morris Louis.