Bea Scaccia (b.1978, Veroli, Italy) earned her BA and MFA at the Accademia di Belle Arti in Rome where she studied with the late Italian artist Gino Marotta. In her paintings, she reworks the elements that collectively give rise to illusions of beauty and constructions of appearance, compressing them on the canvas as surreal, uncanny marks of affectation. Investigating the cultural links between feminine splendor and monstrosity, she builds pictorial compositions that can be read as true parodies of bon ton.
Read MoreA trained realist painter, Scaccia's method is more spontaneous rather than it is planned. She uses recurring visual tropes such as faux fur, jewels, wigs, cloth to signify darker psychological themes pertaining to female beauty. Pearls and hair clips become infestations; what was seen as well-ordered in the sensual hairdos of the Baroque and Rococo periods becomes unavoidably disturbing. The result is an over-the-top composition exemplifying an existential struggle to be contained.
Since 2011 Scaccia has been based in New York City, and has exhibited in various galleries and institutions both locally and worldwide including Katonah Museum of Art, New York, Galleria Ugo Ferranti, Rome, Galleria Nazionale, Rome, Magazzino Italian Art, NY, and the American University's Katzen Arts Center, Washington, D.C., among others. Her work is found in collections including the William Louis-Dreyfus Foundation and the Portland Museum of Art.
Text courtesy Maruani Mercier.
