Philippe PASQUA

A self taught painter, Phillipe Pasqua produces canvases and drawings that are oversized in both scale and intensity.  These large portraits, lacking in recognizable details, are the primary focus of the artist.  Basing his work on photographs of people at the margins of society, his retreat from the subject is intensified by his rendering of surface texture. 

Any representation of a familiar space is absent from these works.  Whatever the relationship is between the artist and his subjects, it is not visible.  Instead, the viewer is given keys to construct their own conclusions based on what they see. 

The artist presents his vision in a frenzy of brushstrokes.  His pictorial touches aggravate the canvas, making the image almost brutal, and his choice of colors, including blood reds and bruised blues, creates an undeniable vibration on the surface of the canvas.