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On Saturday, June the 20th, the Awarding Ceremony of the International Biennial for Engraving IX Edition took place in Acqui Terme: on this occasion the winners of the current edition have been awarded.
List of winners 2009:
Premio Acqui
Man Zhuang (Japan)
For Away, 2008
Mezzotint, 365 x 535 mm [485 x 645 mm]
 Man Zhuang writes: “I chose to engrave on copperplate and to use China colle, a very thin kind of Chinese paper applied as background during the printing stage with a slight sticking because it is an ancient tradition of my Country; moreover this paper is able to enhance the effects of the mezzotint reproducing subtle changes in colour.
I believe that the mezzotint technique is the best way to render the beauty of light as it allows unequalled shades and variations, painting effects, middle tones and nuances. I use this technique also because it requires a long and laborious intellectual path , the different working phases are contradictory, at first we get the relief engraving, then we remove it, all of these phases require a primordial work producing a mysterious, magic mark, able to transmit the effects I wish: I want to stop the brightness of the instant, to fix it, to understand it. The glow of light is not only a natural force, but also an inner one. With my works I try to catch the brightest instant, to include light into the monochromatic world.
I was born in 1972 in Shanghai, in China; at first I have been interested in medicine and therefore I graduated in Dentistry in 1995, but, after a few years, I entered the Bunka Woman’s University of Tokio in order to attend the course of Graphic Design under the guidance of Takeshi Katori. I have been participating in international graphic competitions since 2003, the first being in Cadaques in Spain, then in Bangkok, Lessedra, Seul, Xativa and Tokio, where I also organized personal exhibitions. My works are included in the collections of the National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts and of the US Library of Congress.
Premio Speciale della Giuria
Roberta Zamboni (Italy)
L’acqua racconta, 3, 2008
Etching, 245 x 325 mm [700 x 500 mm]
Roberta Zamboni writes: “In order to realize “L’acqua racconta” I used the etching on zinc plate: this technique allows me to get the effect of a natural and free drawing. The printing is on ochre- coloured base which I chose in order to emphasize the drawing effect: the ochre colour tends to shade the contrast between the mark and the background and between the different marks. Then, I applied the base on a white sheet, Rosaspina Fabriano.”
My aim is to catch a fragment of Venice: a small drawing of water. The area I work on is limited to very few centimetres, where I have found a great deal of emotions. Thus, the reflections on the water turned into a fantastic world. The landscape reflected and reversed on the water surface and only just rippling of a canal led me to look for a short engraving mark, with which I had to drive the observer to perceive the movement, slow but continuous, going on for centuries, lively and quiet at the same time. My recent works have, as object of the survey, the images caught by the running water; in this graphics, a simple wall is reflected, on a day when the reflections are created by this light we can find only in Venice.”
“I was born in Ravenna in 1964; I got a diploma at the Liceo Artistico, then I went on with my studies and I became advertising expert. I have been dealing nwith printmaking since 2000: since then, I have been creating 170 plates, drypoint and etching. I participated at international competitions for graphic works and I got awards from V Biennal Internacional d’Art Grafic –Ajustament de Sant Carles de la rapita in Spain, from the National Competition of Graphics in Mestre; in 2008 I participated in the International Printmaking Biennal in Istanbul, in the International Biennial in Francavilla al Mare, in the International Triennial Town of Chieri, in the International Competition Ex Libris in Bosia, in the exhibition organized by CONI at Casa Italia in Pechino. My works have been included into the Gabinetto Stampe Antiche e Moderne in Bagnacavallo, into Bertarelli Collection in Milan, into Sartori Collection in Mantova. In 2007, Giorgio Trentin edited my monograph.”
Premio Acquisto
Girolamo Russo (Italy)
Senza titolo, 2008
Varnish motivating force and Aquatint, 430 x 295 mm [680 x 470 mm]
 Girolamo Russo writes: “In order to get chromatic effects of this printing I used the roller twice, once for the red colour and once for the shade of grey, then I went on with the application of fragments in gold leaf, and, at the end, I printed in black the plate engraved with the varnish motivating force and aquatint techniques. I used a zinc plate; the paper Graphia, watermarked, without acids and with alkaline reserve, white-coloured, 270 g.”
"If I really need to find a link between what comes out from the work and what stands outside, the references, maybe more appropriate, seem to lead me to the suffused glooms where the structural plasticism of the Romanesque metaphysical space can be found, to the mosaic irradiation of the Byzantine mysticism marking out the space as shining entity. Thus, the indefinite atmospheres of grazing light contrast with the luminescence of golden fragments which, all together, testify the attempt to make meditation and contemplation coexisting, whereas the red painting of the background stands out and, emotionally, puzzles us.”
“I was born in 1952 in Palermo, the town where I had my artistic education until I got the diploma from the Academy of Fine Arts in the Painting department. My profession as a teacher leads me to Treviso and Milan, where I cooperate, as a printer, with Franco Sciardelli. The experience gives me the possibility of going deeper into mu knowledge about the printmaking techniques and chalcographic printing.”
"Since 1995 I am Full Professor of branches of drawing at the “Liceo” specializing in art subjects Damiani Almeyda in Palermo. Recently, I participated, in 2004, in the opening exhibition of “IV catalogue of the Italian printmakers” at the cultural centre “Le Cappuccine” in Bagnacavallo; in the same year I participated in the second “Italo Grandi Award” promoted by the review “Art Graphics”, I entered the VII and VIII International Biennial for Engraving – Acqui Award, with publication in 2005 and a mention among the selected authors in 2007. For the “Edizioni dell’Angelo” I illustrated the plaquette “A Dream” by Franz Kafka. My works are included in public national collections, such as the “ Gabinetto delle Stampe” in Bagnacavallo, the Civic Collection of Printings Achille Bertarelli” in Milan and the fund “Libri d’ artista” of Panizzi library in Reggio Emilia."
Premio Consorzio del Brachetto d'Acqui
Vladimir Zuev (Russia)
Gravitation 2, 2008
Etching and mixed technique, 495 x 410 mm [700 x 500 mm]
 Vladimir Zuev writes: “ I print from two aluminium plates. The 1st plate is a relief two-colour printing. With the 2nd plate I go on with etching, aquatint, dry point. For the printing I use a soft kind of paper.”
With my work “Gravitation 2” I try to combine both abstract and figurative forms. I’ve created a work which is perceived as an abstract construction in the center of the composition. This is my concept of gravitation of two different entities. In the lowest part of the plate I engrave a note: two faces, a male and a female one. The gravitation generating between a man and a woman is a force of mutual attraction, and, in my opinion, the main force regulating the universe.”
I was born in the Sverdlovsk Region, Russia, in 1959. I attended the Graphic Art Faculty of State Teachers Training Institute in Nizhny Tagil and in Moscow the Republic House of Artists "Cheliuskinskaya" lessons. I teach classical drawing and contemporary graphic at the Graphics Department of the Pedagogic Institute in Nizhny Tagil; I have been a member of the Artist Union of Russia since 1989. I have been dealing with printmaking as well as book illustration. I have participated in more than 200 international graphic art exhibitions, awarded with more than 50 Diplomas, including 12 1st Degree Diplomas; recently, my works have been displayed in personal exhibitions in Moscow, France, Switzerland and Pittsburg in the USA. In 2008 I have been awarded with the International Printmaking Biennial Special prize in Istanbul. Moreover, my works can be found in many public collections in China, Russia, Turkey, Poland, Belgium, Thailand, Spain and even in Association Mouvement Art Contemporain, Chamalieres, Chebske Museum, Cheb, Davis Museum, Wallesley del Massachussetts, Museo Civico di Grafica di Brunico, Museu d’Art Contemporani di Ibiza.”
Premio Giovani
Elena Petrocco (Italy)
Mortificazione, 2007
Drypoint, 415 x 280 mm [570 x 380 mm]
 Elena Petrocco writes: "The work “Mortificazione” is an engraving entirely realized with the direct technique of the Drypoint on a zinc plate. The printing sent to the competition has been made on a German paper called Hahnemueller. The unequalled character of the mark realized through this technique, characterized by the suffused glow of the edges and by the precise line, gave me the possibility of reaching the best result I could get. As the drypoint is only intended for few printings – the mark tends to disappear because of the pressure made by the press during the printing – in the following copies I had to intervene in order to rectify the lighter and more delicate tones.
The work belongs to a project called “ The Unveiled Body” I realized while attending the Academy of Fine Arts in L’Aquila and then presented as my degree thesis.
My survey starts from the opinion that the body is today, more than ever, the centre of our contemporary tensions, great economic, philosophical, political, genetic, media, scientific and social considerations are directed towards the body. It’s a paradigm, constantly renewing itself as far as it is engraved and marked on the societies’ memory. It’s a magnetic algorithm drawing our eye and “raiding” our mind.
In our exhibitionist and vulgar culture, the naked body is fashionable – it’s no more a taboo – but an expression of corporeity made banal, endlessly repeated, propagandizing a useless eroticism, without any involvement. The body becomes a ready-made product of the organic sphere, of the world, of the human being coming out to be flesh without mystery. I have been trying to analyze all this through marks and shapes, by interpreting them in a succession of change and contamination cancelling the already weak frontiers of knowledge.
“Mortificazione” intends to be a description of affliction, it’s a container of the “vacuum-sealed” beauty; metaphor of the senses lost in the broken up anatomy merchandised by media as flesh for slaughter. “Mortificazione” represents the awareness of the body deceiving the senses and the truth and it shows its pain in its imprisonment of knots and ropes.
My work is a “manifesto” of protest reminding that the body must be matter of life, being the only evidence of the existence, the only thing giving us the possibility of not disappearing in the ether and not to be robotized and swallowed up by the virtual space.
I was born in Campobasso in 1985; I got a First Level diploma in Fine arts and media studies – Course of Graphics and I’m now attending the last year of the Multimedia Graphics course – Second Level. I approached the world of chalcographic printmaking when I was 16 and the Academy of Fine Arts gave me the possibility of going deeper into my knowledge of this art. I have had several artistic experiences, increased in these last two years with my participation into exhibitions and competitions. The most important exhibitions have been in 2008 the Joint Exhibition “Glances at the town” at the Sixteenth Century Castle in L’Aquila, realizing a twinning with the Graphic Department of the Academy in Valencia; the exhibitions held in the palace of the Region of Abruzzo and in MUSPAC, the experimental Museum of Contemporary Art in L’Aquila, the exhibition at the Museo del Corso (Rome Foundation), in Via del Corso after mention and Diploma of Merit for the competition Fondazione G. Onesti – Italian National Olympic Academy with the work “Italian Disease, The Doping”.
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First Award
Purchase Award
Purchase Award
