I WANT YOU

Description

This design was created during the 2 years of attendance at the Accademia di Belle Arti di Bologna (1982/1983); in that period, for a whole series of events and circumstances, I felt like a kind of call from God, I seemed to perceive as a kind of vocation. At first has seemed a strong and decisive call to me, if not even overbearing; so I think the best representation of this mystical perception is one in which I used as a template Uncle Sam, one of the famous manifesto of 1917, who looking at you in the eyes almost angrily, invites you to join the army of the United States. With this sketch I wanted to realize, in academic circle and particularly in the section of "Ornamental Plastics", a bust in terracotta, but then for various contingencies, nothing came of it.
After some time I perceived this strong internal call in more peaceful and loving way; therefore I felt the need to make a more sweetened version of the subject and I chose the painting "Salvator mundi" of Antonello in Messina as original; the work of the messinese painter appeared immediately congenial, since from the blessing Christ to the recruiter Christ the step was short.
I must say that after 33 years of this call has remained little, certainly the numerous distractions and temptations, which made me gradually leave the religious life, were also they very strong and domineering.