Suddenly it’s summertime.
First shy with a few hours warmer at the end of the morning.
An almost summery weather that oscillates between changing colors and the light that corrodes the winter.
The darkness becomes flimsy, no more lights in the houses.
Sunrise comes after a short time. When the moon is tired of shining, the sun arrives smiling and you go from deep blue to light blue that changes into yellow and pink.
At dawn you realize something has changed.
Summertime looks you in the face and tells you that everything has changed.
When the heat comes and summer leaves no doubt, I start pulling out of the drawers the artwork I produced.
Because summer for me is a winter concept.
When there is snow (less and less), ice, darkness, that’s when I perceive the essence of summer.
I imagine the beauty of the clear sea shimmering in the sun, the golden beaches, the smell of salt and seaweed.
Only by imagining I can stand the heat.
And I begin to create.
I imagine situations like Agatha Christie, with rich, aristocratic women spending their holidays in luxury hotels. In distant and exotic dreamy places.
And in aristocratic holidays, mysterious crimes happen. During moonlight dances, during dinners by the sea, during fancy dress parties. All situations that light up our imagination.
Because in summer we accumulate fantastic dreams.
Summer is also synonymous with 1950s film atmospheres, with actresses and actors who have become international stars in our imagination. Nobody suffers from the heat, they are all bewitched by the light from the sun from the wind and nobody ever complains about the unbearable weather conditions.
Summer weather is crucial in books and films, because exceptional things happen.
The heat, the holidays, the suspended time in the holiday cities are all part of it.
Everything seems perfect, everything light and beautiful.
All tanned and sporty, with soft, transparent clothes and light thoughts.
Drawing is easy. Just imagine.
What do you imagine at summertime?
First of all, the colors.
They’re blinding, violent, flashy.
The almost African colors. Colors reminiscent of the South.
Or the whole range of whites reminiscent of Greece, the walls of southern Italy. The lime on the walls, the stone used in Italian art.
Let’s imagine men and women lying in the sun, entering the water hesitantly because they are hot, walking in landscapes blurred by the heat.
Women with big hats, wide and voluptuous dresses, light.
Dresses in silk or linen, in fresh cotton.
Fewer accessories and more rooms are drawn.
The sea is always in the background, sometimes it’s just a suggestion.
With watercolours, summer weather is easy to sketch.
All you need is blue and yellow and a very subtle graphic sign.
It is the colour that speaks, much more than the shapes.
Red everywhere, a colour that is actually used in every season. Because it’s warm, deep, passionate.
And then suggest couples.
Because summer is the perfect time for the birth of even fleeting love.
It’s a classic drawing of love and beaches when it comes to summer.
Like drawing hearts and lovers on Valentine’s Day.
But there’s a truth in the obvious.
Summertime makes us light in every situation.
With autumn, we will all return to our responsibilities.
Falling in love without serious thought is almost a place in the collective imagination.
Usually the figures I draw are devoid of accessories.
Beauty is given by the atmosphere.
Summer in an illustration is suggested by colours or situations. The characters do not have great details, they explode in color without additional information.
But I also think of my moving canvases, as I call my scarves.
In fact I design the accessories to color the summer.
My summer scarves are always born with ice, just like the designs.
And I imagine they will be from collectors who love travel, holidays and the sun.
I imagine their beauty adorned with my scarves.
On cool summer evenings.
Although I must admit that some customers have worn my summer scarves in winter, to remember the heat and holidays.
They are scarves that tell the freedom of movement and the lightness of summer.
All this happens in winter or in late autumn.
When the time of summer is far away.
Today we are at the beginning of summer, after a strange and terrible time related to covid.
The idea of summer and holiday is still strange and many will dream of impossible journeys.
Right now it makes almost sacred sense to open my drawers and take out what I created in winter.
Now all the colours and shapes I have created will travel the world and find their right place.
Designed for summer, they will find their summer at last.
The time of summer will melt the ice from the time when I sewed, drew, painted.
And the perfect circle will now lead me to consider the unbearable summer heat to create something else.
That will be about darkness, cold, winter.
