Ronald Ventura

This work is in very good overall condition as viewed. This work comes with a Plexiglas box.
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Ronald Ventura is well known for his appropriation of Western iconography in his paintings. The current work Fragmented of Light is a direct allusion to the Italian artist Caravaggio's piece Saint Matthew and the Angel that was completed in 1602 for the Contarelli Chapel in the church of San Luigi dei Francesi in Rome.

According to Ventura's research, the Italian artist  depicted the saint as an unkempt peasant, strikingly pedestrian in the presence of the angel, so the church rejected the artist’s radical presentation of St. Matthew. The painting was later sold by the church and hung in a museum, however when the town was bombed the work was destroyed.

"It’s a fascinating backstory, which I learned right after I finished this piece," Ventura said. "For this painting, I explored the illusion of light, removing the “traditional light source,” putting pyramidal shapes instead to distract the viewer from finding out where exactly the light is coming from.  Light — as in the Caravaggio painting — could be seen as a metaphor for inspiration. The glimmer of epiphany".

As a painting that references a work in the Western art history canon, Fragmented of Light succinctly blends symbols of modernization with classical aesthetics and motifs. It is ultimately a rebirth of the new world with the old one, and Ventura's play of imagery establishes in the painting a fresh perspective to the Italian religious parable.