Nicholas Milinazzo will exhibit his electrochemically-inspired abstract paintings during the month of February in Sagacitas (Latin—roughly translated “I perceive keenly”), a solo art show at 2nd helpings Gallery in Roanoke.
As a national debate champion and former aspiring lawyer, Milinazzo had always planned to make good use of his brain. Upon realizing a greater calling to visual arts, following a decade of painting for leisure, the California native’s view of all things cerebral expanded profoundly. Ignoring illusory barriers between science and art, Milinazzo now makes the beautiful mystery of the brain his ally in a greater way than he had originally surmised.
A portrait artist for his entire BFA program at California State University—Stanislaus, Milinazzo yielded to a longtime interest in abstraction as a graduate student at Radford University, where he began teaching in 2012. It was also at Radford that an extracurricular fascination with brain chemistry became the foundation of his abstract repertoire.
“I started reading tons of contemporary literature on the brain—this most vital, complex machine,” Milinazzo says. He zeroed in on basic chemical reactions as his creative pivot points, and the perplexing scientific studies soon merged with his studio practices. “As I research the brain, I take note of words that spark my imagination,” says Milinazzo. “I internalize these words as fuel to guide a painting wherever it wants to go.”
Milinazzo uses traditional materials to make his pieces, while he has pioneered methods for preparation and application. He favors blending oil pigments with various chemicals to achieve liquid, semitransparent mixtures, then applying them to surfaces with what he deems “a combination of compositional planning and process-driven spontaneity.” The paintings, as a result, are grounded in science without making any distinction from that which is otherworldly.
Sagacitas will be one of Milinazzo’s first local solo shows in a non-academic setting—and he is interested to see what reactions it draws.
“My experience has been that people in Roanoke prefer more recognizable art like landscapes and still lifes,” says Milinazzo. But he refuses to let that make him nervous.
“People will always want to find an ‘image’ in your work. It’s in our nature to identify, to classify,” Milinazzo explains. “A successful painting evokes something from the viewer. That ‘something’ is up to them. A painting doesn’t fail if it’s disliked—it fails through indifference.”
The artist’s reception for Sagacitas will take place at 2nd helpings on Saturday, February 14th, from 1-3pm. Admission and special Valentine’s Day refreshments are complimentary.
For more information about 2nd helpings, please visit www.2ndhelpings.org, or call (540) 491-9409.