the interview
twelve o’clock, May 26, 2021 – 2:47 pm
The Neapolitan street artist, author of giant portraits from Martin Luther King to Gagarin, quoted in a school text: “Important messages in the faces of my human tribe”
of Roberto Russo
Ciro Cerullo, a Neapolitan street artist of a Dutch mother, known by the alias Jorit, at 31 years of age has already finished in the history of art school textbooks. The one for the fifth grade by Loescher-D’Anna Zanichelli, who dedicates a paragraph to him and compares him to a sacred monster like Banksy.
Jorit, her and Banksy together in a school textbook ….
«For me it is a great emotion, I did not know anything about it, a friend pointed it out to me and I was speechless. Banksy is a source of inspiration for me as well as Blu. They are undoubtedly aligned artists, as I am, of course, even if we must understand the term lined up ».
Explain to us better.
«I believe that art must remain above politics, from this point of view I would approach it to philosophy. Therefore, being deployed in my case does not mean keeping for one party or the other, but delivering messages to the people that I consider important through the murals ».
Martin Luther King, Maradona, Nelson Mandela, Gramsci, Gagarin, are just some of the characters you have portrayed on the facades of buildings in many countries around the world. Why did you choose “gigantism” with representations that are at least 15 meters high? He even created the highest mural in the world, 100 meters, at the Naples business center which portrays the eyes of five sportsmen. Where did the choice of the huge size come from?
«From the desire to make those faces that represent important values for me as visible as possible, even from a distance. Mine was a step-by-step path, I started painting when I was 13, as I grew up I felt the need to create bigger and bigger works ».
I guess the difficulties increase with the size of the portraits.
“Sure. At first I used the aluminum ladder, then I moved on to scaffolding and scaffolding, when necessary also to the elevator basket. It is evident that a precise study phase of the vertical facade is needed with the proportions that must be recalculated and adapted to the large dimensions ».
shadow carousel
Jorit enters the art history books
All in all he chose the more complex path, he left behind traditional street art to “return” to the figurative.
«For me, art must always be a combination of technical skill and message. I do not prefer conceptual art in general, but it is clear that I am enchanted by works like those of Pollock while I find the marks left on the walls without meaning more banal at times. We all started in this way, with street art that I do not intend to deny, however we must have the possibility to choose an original path ».
Will he continue to paint giant faces on buildings?
“I always experiment. During the pandemic, I chose to devote myself to the representations of pixelated human eyes on horizontal surfaces. In the city of Giugliano, for example, I created a work of this kind through the eyes of Giovan Battista Basile, the seventeenth-century literary author of The account of the accounts, which was born right there ».
With success, criticism often comes too. There are those who even accuse him of being a “regime artist”, because he accepts public commissions. In short, they want to label it “left”.
“Left and right, I don’t know if they still make sense. I repeat, art is not in the middle but above. Then, even on public commissions I clarify that I only accept those that convince me, that I find consistent with my thinking. Fortunately, I have private clients who buy my works and therefore retain the freedom to choose ».
The last question concerns the tribal signs on the faces he depicts and also the fleshing on his face. How are they born?
“From the influence of Africa where I went several times. In Tanzania I painted a portrait of a school teacher and since then I have decided to use those marks on the works. They want to indicate that we all belong to the human tribe. After I decided to accept them also on my face, obviously I turned to a professional ».
May 26, 2021 | 14:47
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