La Faire Amore' III

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Oil on canvas over sculpted foam

50 x 40 x 5 inches

2023

Renicarnisi Medici

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Oil on canvas

40 x 70 inches

2024

Cold alabaster steps downward, into the darkness of a candle lit epoch

The light tapping of a chisel upon marble,enter the tomb of Giuliano Medici..

Time accelerates I am floating, hoovering above her

Eye-to-eye an inch from her approaching face,

And she is Night .

Time, light, magnetism, gravity conspire

at the behest of the muse, she beckons.

the smell of earth, freshly sculpted stone, dust of marble enters my nostrils

I watch Michelangelo below, he shapes her muscular limbs

And she is Night .

I have always been here, 497 years, a moment ago

Suspended in the vertigo of a parallel reality

Via elasticity of consciousness, I am at peace.

Familiarity and Benvenuto pervade my being

And she is Night .

On the floor of tomb, particles of light form inside of me.

Luminous azure, magenta photons emit from the cracks in my chest

The laser light particles find her and she me.

Guided her light to a stairway to heaven,

encircled by Venus Italica, Colossus

And she is Night .

R.M.

7.26.2024

BREED

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Oil over sculpted material

55 x 70 x 4 inches

2024

Love’s alchemy kiln

Spectral vapors blaze

Her poised indifference an innocent plea

His sightless delirium increasing percent. 

Resigned to believe, in memories film

Her shapeshift allure roils a spectral sea

His leaden command rises favor

A morphic breed suspended in torment.

Plum deep cadmium flowing bright

Ecstasy delayed and bliss denied

Emission occurs his eyes roll back

Her spawn emits aureolae light.

R.M.

7.22.2024

Avatar Incarnate

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Oil on canvas

40 x 84 inches

2023

I was seated on the last barstool next to the open door in Cipriani’s Bar, awaiting Helen, who was in our pensione, making final adjustments to her evening costume. With few cares, and fully under the spell of the Adriatic’s shimmering jewel, I blissfully sipped the evening’s first Campari and soda. Suddenly, a man wearing a black mask cavorted precariously and gleefully into plain view through the open portal, snaring my startled gaze. I perceived this jester’s mirthful abandon and improbable dance as a kaleidoscopic blur. For a frozen moment, as in a Muybridge photo, he stared directly into my eyes and emitted a slight smile, as if he knew me. Leaving more than enough lira on the bar, I slipped off my stool and followed him. His expression conveyed that his performance was intended for me alone. Still confounded, and lacking a witness, I cannot be certain of the events of that night. They resemble a dream, and yet I am haunted by vestiges and bits of memory too clear to dismiss, too unreal to accept. Was the experience real? Was it something that took place outside or within my own mind? Hoping to reconcile the events of that evening, I began sketches soon after returning to New York. I decided to reconstruct the feelings and events as best I could in a painting. So, using my keenest recollection, I set out with fervor to paint the jester’s appearance. The only thing of which I was certain was the costume itself. I also hoped to sort out the preoccupations of the unconscious mind from reality. This time, with a paintbrush in hand, I again followed the jester. I spent a good deal of time conceiving and tossing around a variety of compositions. Like any other, the picture—which I entitled Avatar Incarnate

Rob Mango - 2014 “100 Paintings, an Artist Life in New York City” courtesy, No Room for Doubt inc.

Dark Passenger

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Oil on canvas over sculpted foam

64 x 43 x 4 inches

2023

Persone di Colore

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Oil over sculpted material

48 x 58 x 3 inches

2024

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Three Bells

Just outside the back of his callused mind

compressed onto a shiny metal orb,

a conjured notion avoids, untethered.

Touch and felt impression hesitantly ignored.

Retinal cognition will assure its design

yet a plurality of faculty fails to absorb,

it’s weight, “not seen”, radius “lacks measure”.

The tally of gods denounces, yet a single eye implored.

With adjacent hemisphere’s approval maligned

and memory in denial, objectivity was poised to abhor,

a visceral slab of bone, powerfully descends in leather.

Its Celsius pulse, not in accord…

Under and behind fallen tears, streams combine

They splash and puddle, as losses scored,

He being diminished, himself the transgressor.

With thought and perception divergent, his future unmoored.

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La Faire Amore' II

Pain and desire invert posture momentarily, it began.

Under the weighty demand of hope, they

paused.

Loves laser light illumination,

ended.

Their negative double exposure reappeared before their existence in, the

past.

STAR

The colliding background pieces of turquoise and cobalt violet on yellow were executed as separate designs, with less concern to supporting the overall composition. This approach is much different in a background than I might normally undertake.

My hope is to capture the viewers interest with the background first, possibly a default approach to pictorial success. I want the color here to be like food, the thick texture (feel) of the oil paint mixed with sand is equally important as the taste (hue),when held on the tongue.

Her foreshortened torso bent forward toward the viewer, while turning on axis upon one leg, allows the position of the other three limbs to pose with her stylized hair shape to form a five-pointed STAR.

I chose to wrap each point of the star in a ribbon of ultramarine oil,emphasizing the radial aspect of each arm, leg and hair. Later coating the surface with tiny crystals,(which may not be perceptible in this photograph).The crystal coating lightened the ultramarine hue effectively.

The five-pointed star, first appear in Egyptian iconography, later in Mesopotamian cuneiform , ultimately adopted to symbolize the western culture.

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NEST

Love in the Ruins, a motif for the ages.

The Bald Eagle nestled inside the man; it embodies his relentless instinct to dominate ,forcing his prey to submit.

 Seen here, aggressively seeking an exit. His lover it appears, will have none of it, exhilarated by its prowess.  Her hand preventing the predator’s escape.

 Or is her hand evicting the bird, thus taming her chosen mate.

Americans assign an array of attributes to this bird. Having observed them in their natural habitat they live up to these and more.

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CULT OF ISIS

The Pharaoh Akhenaten is released from the soft protective wings of ISIS - a high queen of Egypt according to ancient Egyptian mythology. She presides as protector and consort of the dead.

The moment has arrived, she casts him gently in the direction of the opening in the tomb wall, he drifts toward the time-space continuum …. Anibus awaits.

Anibus, the dog-headed god presided over the mummification process, and now serves as guardian of the portal to the afterlife. The mortal king of Egypt is represented by the sculpted bust, but his immortal soul is not visible. Anibus will entrust the pharaoh unto Sekret in his journey through time.

In the foreground a mortal woman is poised, she offers herself to the assembled Cult of Isis. Anibus focuses the cosmic ray upon her, and she is transformed into Sekret.

The silver inlaid alchemist symbols, upon her limbs, entitle her unique human qualifications; allegiance, stealth, magik and healing.

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UNDER HEAVEN

Ethereal mirror, azure surrounds

Longitudinal waves stream Verde and Lime

Love's, former purpose abandoned for now.

Rather, Jete' glissade intersects verve and time.

Imperial poise breaks the barrier of sound.

Heptagonal theorem, curves and angles align.

Thereof he who yearned, sadness endowed.

Gathered void in upturned palm, heaven's sign.

Material Lavender meanders her gown

Tangential vole', planter flexion defined.

Dove in flight, Avant beauty unbowed

Patter-Pitter brise', frappe refined.

Zeal la Turquoise transparent renown

Proverbial treasure of earth be mine.

Above and around brushed copper enshrouds.

Lathered flesh aloft, a body sublime.

STREAM OF DREAMS

Eddies unspool fine scarlet strings,

Cantilevered spine, immersion begins.

Alizarin crimson untwines, Dolly Vardan collides.

In playful sport, they seek and hide.

Arching vertebrae of myth and bone,

protect Cutthroat and German Brown alone.

Fauve fingertips stake metacarpal cape.

anointed sediment touched, cause crustacean unsafe.

~

Knitted steeple bows above, shadow stream’s floor,

swift music hums, ‘yearning amore’.

Violet muse, the wandering kind

dwelling in mist, ether, and mind.

Perpetual dream in an endless night

awake nor dead, matters naught.

Craving Hooved beast, her fantasy sought,

A lone Satyr tenderly caught.

Bosom’s warm cauldron now to restore,

Brook trout ascend and Rainbows soar.

~

Feminine muse, ERATO wanders free,

child of powerful Zeus, and Mnemosyne.

Cloned of dorsal fishes, with shape-shifting allure,

irresistible force, stalking centaur procured.

Appeased alas, she enters the creek,

Siren’s magnetism, Aphrodite’s beauty competes,

prefers teasing trout, shiny and sleek.

~

ERATO traversed centuries of depiction,

Appears here alas in oil paints lustrous fine fiction,

Artist fingers pinch brush, a conception in paint, depicting sleeps intricate vision.

Where Species swim glazed with careful precision.

Muse in supple forms tying Grayling tatted fin,

sojourning continues her legend of sin.

The painter unseen at vanishing point, behind dream’s pale light,

Dwelling place of one artist acolyte.