Antonietta Grassi has been committed to the practice of abstract painting for most of her career. Her work, which at first appear as hard-edged geometric abstractions, are composed of multi-layered, painted surfaces where the touch of the hand is paramount. Grassi paints layered, intuitively derived forms that are intersected by fine, thread-like lines—creating works where textile, architecture, analog technologies, and painting’s twentieth century history collide.
Through her nuanced and layered palette, she explores color and light to create perceptual spaces that are drawn from memory and imagination. Grassi’s work is simultaneously mathematical and painterly, reflecting a process-driven approach that belies the organized compositions of the geometric forms prevalent in the works.
Antonietta Grassi’s paintings and works on paper have been featured in solo and group exhibitions at museums and galleries in Canada, the United States, and in Europe, including Musée National des Beaux-Arts du Quebec, the McClure Gallery, Stewart Hall Art Gallery, the Leonard and Bina Ellen Art Gallery, Harcourt House, Artcite, Galerie R3, Maison de la Culture Frontenac and the Patrick Mikhail Gallery in Canada; the MAACK Kalenarte in Italy; Kunstwerk Calshutte in Budelsdorf, Germany and the Boston Center for the Arts, Trestle Gallery, Crossing Art Gallery, and Manifest Gallery in the United States. In addition, her work is in public, corporate, and private collections, including the Musée National des Beaux-arts du Québec (MNBAQ) Global Affairs Canada, the Archives of Ontario, Groupe Desjardins, Museo MAACK, the Boston Public Library, Yamana Gold, and the Stewart Hall Art Gallery in Pointe Claire, Quebec. She is the recipient of awards and honors, including grants from the Canada Council for the Arts and the Conseil des Arts et Lettres du Quebec. She has participated in numerous artist residencies such the Banff Center for the Arts in Alberta, Canada, the Vermont Studio Center and the Studios at MASS MOCA, MA, USA. Her work has been reviewed in various publications such as ArtForum, Vie des Arts, The Globe and Mail, Le Devoir and many others. Grassi lives and works in Montreal, Canada.
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“I think we all tap into memories and spaces from our past, and that's why certain things resonate with people. Our subconscious is always at work. As artists, we are able to formalize it, to capture these fragments from the subconscious, and try to make sense out of it.”
- Antonietta Grassi
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Antonietta Grassi
Lifelines Extended (Lignes de vie... prolongement) | Galerie d’art de l’hôtel de ville | Hôtel de ville d’OttawaAntonietta Grassi - Lifelines Extended (Lignes de vie... prolongement) Galerie d’art de l’hôtel de ville, Hôtel de ville d’Ottawa From March 11 - April 18 2021 -
“I really like working on paper because it’s where all of my ideas first come out and where I experiment. I tend to leave a lot of the negative space, I like that the material becomes an important visual element.”
- Antonietta Grassi
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Works on paper
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“I like the challenge of working with geometry and precision because it’s in opposition to how I think, where nothing is measured and everything is intuitive… I started to work this way after my parents died. It was a way to contain the chaos.”
- Antonietta Grassi
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Works on canvas and linen
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“I’m interested in this intersection between technology and the handmade. I like the ambiguity of how, at first glance, my work could have been done on a computer. But I’m very much a painter and love work that reflects the handmade.”
- Antonietta Grassi
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Many of my paintings resemble a weaving loom or building plans, providing a link to my own roots. Yet it is not only my personal history that I am alluding to in my work but also my interest in forgotten histories of women, technology, and obsolescence.”
“My paintings attempt to reconnect fragments of encoded memories of objects, like blueprints for histories that have been filed away, yet delicately retrieved through the physical language of paint.”
- Antonietta Grassi
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