It is clear that Armando Testa likes creative adventures, he is an «explorer» by profession: when we come across some of his true inventions on the small screen or on the walls of a street, the comment has to be «Mr Testa, I presume». Indeed he has been “doing” rather than «being» a creative his whole life long, indeed permanently creative, whatever media used, from conversation to poster, to projects for the press or television. But his latest exhibition inspired by the finger is not a new adventure. For many years he had already picked it out as the star of many of his drawings and covers. Sometimes as a game or a joke (Armando is without doubt one of the wittiest men I know and as far as he is concerned if a person is lacking in a spark of humour then you can’t perceive that person’s intelligence), at other times he was truly excited by the essence and formal beauty of this little dynamic masterpiece of the human body. This miniature with human physiology intrinsic to the body itself, this Lilliputian attached to our arms and our brains. It’s my opinion that in times like these, when from the artistic point of view everything has been done and everything has been consumed, where such frantic speed has made us lose a sense of time so much that we rehash not only the day before yesterday but even today, deciding to hold an exhibition inspired by the finger is quite remarkable. I am sure that for Armando this is a challenge overflowing with humour, provocation and that se...
It is clear that Armando Testa likes creative adventures, he is an «explorer» by profession: when we come across some of his true inventions on the small screen or on the walls of a street, the comment has to be «Mr Testa, I presume». Indeed he has been “doing” rather than «being» a creative his whole life long, indeed permanently creative, whatever media used, from conversation to poster, to projects for the press or television. But his latest exhibition inspired by the finger is not a new adventure. For many years he had already picked it out as the star of many of his drawings and covers. Sometimes as a game or a joke (Armando is without doubt one of the wittiest men I know and as far as he is concerned if a person is lacking in a spark of humour then you can’t perceive that person’s intelligence), at other times he was truly excited by the essence and formal beauty of this little dynamic masterpiece of the human body. This miniature with human physiology intrinsic to the body itself, this Lilliputian attached to our arms and our brains. It’s my opinion that in times like these, when from the artistic point of view everything has been done and everything has been consumed, where such frantic speed has made us lose a sense of time so much that we rehash not only the day before yesterday but even today, deciding to hold an exhibition inspired by the finger is quite remarkable. I am sure that for Armando this is a challenge overflowing with humour, provocation and that secret «morality» (ah!) of work (even artistic) which is said to be the reserve of us Piedmontese. In short, there is still enormous pomposity in denying the enormity of subject matter, indeed more often derived from reality and abstraction, and we force ourselves into seclusion concerning a subject which is seemingly unimportant and trivial, but which in reality is just as demanding as drawing the human body and face. A man of synthesis, used to digging deep into one single subject (how many hundreds, indeed thousands of little drawings of fingers have I seen him do in recent months?), Testa offers us a series of pictorial interpretations of the finger which by extension, and variety and meticulousness are the both the umpteenth and rare demonstration that authentic and tireless «high creative tension» can come up with new inventions or at least images and new symbols from whatever excuse you might wish. For those sirs who are professional painters this – from an adman/painter – is a challenge almost an affront: it’s a slap, indeed a «finger in the eye» which proclaims a duel.
A finger in the eye of Umberto Allemandi