Vico Fabbris: Beer and Burgers
Botanical Unknown
By: Charles Giuliano - Mar 27, 2007
In 2006 the Italian born, Boston based artist, Vico Fabbris, had a one person show "Botanical Unknown" with the Los Angeles branch of the prestigious Forum Gallery. He has recently won a fellowship from the Mass Council and has been included in the Annual of the DeCordova Museum. Overall, life is good for Vico and his wife, the photographer, critic and art historian. Grace Consoli. What's not to like about teaching during the winter and summers in their 1,200 square foot apartment in Florence in a building and neighborhood, a short walk from Santa Maria del Carmine and Masaccio's Brancacci Chapel, that dates to the Renaissance.
I met them back in the early 1980s when I visited Provincetown off and on to conduct research into the history of the art colony. Vico worked in the kitchen of Sal's a popular restaurant started when Ciro and Sal, two artists who cooked, split up and started separate establishments. Back then Vico spoke little or no English and still has a wonderfully colorful and eccentric accent and manner of slaughtering the language in the most utterly charming and hilarious manner. That didn't matter to Sal del Deo who enjoyed bantering with Vico in his Americanized Italian. Grace at the time ran the Provincetown Group Gallery in its quarters above the tennis court. She was a friend of Ellen O'Donnell, then the director of the Provincetown Art Association and Museum, who introduced me to artists related to research on Karl Knaths and the group which showed with the seminal Sun Gallery which led to working on a traveling exhibition with Lester Johnson. Later for Ellen I organized "Kind of Blue: Four African American Artists from Provincetown; Benny Andrews, Emilio Cruz, Earl Pilgrim and Bob Thompson."
Those Provincetown years were great. Recently I met with Vico for a Beer and Burger and a chance to catch up with his recent work and exhibitions as well as sort through the process by which he came to settle and work in America. Overall, it proved to be one of the most enjoyable and entertaining encounters in the ongoing series of pubcrawls with artists. But there was a bit of a twist as Vico is a vegetarian so that tossed the burger and not much of a drinker so we were held to the pace of a single winter ale. Also, Italians dine late so he settled for a snack. But you don't have to ply Vico with booze to evoke great stories. Wind him up, let him go, and he can spin tales with the ease of a master story teller.
Actually, it is a part of the work. He described how in the studio he was listening to PBS and a story on species of plants that has become extinct. "Ah, you see, eco," he said. "Like that I had the idea to make images of those plants that we will never see. The light bulb came on and I started making endless drawings and eventually water colors." I asked how many by now. He suggested perhaps several hundred. Eventually, he added text and then landscapes that have to be environmentally appropriate to the exotic flower that he imagines and creates. There were experiments of adding other elements such as pollinators or bugs but with the shrug and exaggerated gesture that punctuates many of his points he stated, "Basta, enough." There is much about this conversation that I am not adequate to convey. Words fail when more effectively this should be presented on video tape. There is no way to be faithful in conveying all of the wonderful and subtle body language or moments when he breaks out into a warm laugh at his own jokes.
While he tells his tale with a lilting, humorous touch, much of it actually isn't very funny. In fact it is rather grim and remarkable that he survived such hard times with ironic humor and a light touch. When he was just five his father died. He had been a prisoner of war in France under harsh conditions and then he went to work in the mines where he contracted lung disease. Asked if he had memories of his father the answer was just watching him die. The mother was destitute and in order for her three sons to get an education they attended boarding school and Vico recalls seeing her only once or twice a year. He attended three different boarding schools: One run by nuns and two by brothers.
Did you go to mass, I asked. "Are you kidding, every day," he answered. But he was hardly a little saint. It could be rough and tumble among the boys and you have to take care of yourself. He stated with some pride that "I could throw a rock so hard it hit you like a machine gun." Ouch. But he never knew how to keep quiet when told to shut up. "I was always talking," he said. Sometime with tough consequences. Pow. One brother knocked him flat and leaning over the table he wanted to show me where there was still a bump and a dent on his forehead. "I ended up in the hospital," he said. But in addition to being a rowdy kid "I always drew" he recalls. "But I was hyperactive and always bouncing around so much that they gave me a nickname like a fruit fly or something buzzing about."
There was also a rebellious streak. When the barber came he refused to have his head shaved like the other boys. "I didn't want to look like a convict," he said. "When the barber came I escaped and hid in the woods until it became cold and dark and I went back. The director called me into the office and said "If every boy were like you this place would be a mess." "I asked him 'Do you like girls? Would you like it in church if they looked at you like a criminal?' He looked at me, thought it over and said 'You're right' and sent me into town for a haircut."
When the director offered to let Vico go into town he asked "Do you have any shoes?" The answer was no and the director went and got a pair saying "Try these." He wore the shoes on dress up occasions for the next ten years "until they fit." When the sole eventually came loose "I repaired them with a piece of copper wire from an electric cord and that fixed them for another few years. Like my father I can fix anything." A few years ago they bought a multi family dwelling in Greenfield, Mass. and Vico has supplied the sweat equity that has now resulted in a condo in Jamaica Plain.
When not getting into fights and mischief in boarding school, Vico recalls enjoying being in nature and sitting for hours under big trees. "There were some huge trees like Sequoias," he said. "They were so enormous. I wondered what food they ate and that if I ate the same food I could also grow to be big and strong. Like the trees. Years later in Provincetown Gracie asked if I would like some pancakes. When she gave me Maple Syrup I thought, aha, this is the sap of the tree and this is what will make be big and strong. I will drink the Maple Syrup."
Just how did you become an artist I asked. "My father was an artist but my grandfather was the manager of the electric company in the valley (Near Trento in the Dolomite area). My parents had no money for electricity but the wires passed by their house. My father was very clever in tapping into the wires in a manner that was concealed. He said to my mother, we will have electricity, but don't tell grandpa. So he wired the house but it was hidden. He rigged it up with a device so if you opened the front door the power went off. But if you close the door it turned back on. One day my grandfather came to visit and closed the door. Oh my. He felt it was his duty to call the police but we were so poor the town didn't do anything about it."
When he was seventeen he finished the boarding school and was among a group of several friends who applied for and got admitted to the Academia d' Firenze. It was a four year program, in addition to two years of graphic design, which resulted in the equivalent of an M.F.A degree. The school was free but since he was not a native of Florence and had no family there the state provided money for food and rent. The apartment studio he rented they eventually bought when faced with the choice of purchase or eviction. He studied primarily with the artist Fernando Ferulli.
"I met Grace at the Academy and in 1980 she said come spend time in Provincetown," he said. "I had no money and spoke no English but I was curious and we stayed with friends. But I was shocked when I saw a transvestite walking down the street with a man acting like his dog on a leash. It was crazy and I asked Gracie what was going on? She explained that it was Transvestite Day. I got my work in a street show in New York and won a prize. I heard them giving away the second and third prizes which were gift certificates to restaurants. Then I heard 'First prize goes to Vico Fabbris.' But first prize was a piece of wood with a metal plate on it. I would rather go to a restaurant. I had some luck and showed my work. And I got a job washing dishes for Sal and eventually started cooking with him. He learned to cook from his mother."
He and Grace started to spend half of the year in Italy and summers in Provincetown. They had a great deal on a place but eventually lost it. I asked if they miss P Town. The answer was "Not really there are no artists left there. It got too expensive and they have mostly moved out."
So what about the art business? How is it going? He reports that he had five shows in 2006. There was Forum L.A. as well as a show in villa in Italy near Mantua. With Rice Polak in Provincetown. In Boston with Gurari Collections on Charles Street and at the St. Botolph Club. In addition to the watercolors which sell for up to $6,000 in a large format, he also does editions of digital prints that sell briskly for around $300. Recently he has begun to paint in oil on canvas. The work is very beautiful and the fanciful flowers are sensual and even erotic. They remind me of the 19th century painter Martin Johnson Heade. Yes, Vico nodded his head, but he admires Sargent primarily for his watercolors and the somber paintings of Edward Hopper.
There have been sales and critical success as well as grants and awards. Is it ever enough? Like most artists it is a commitment and struggle. But he has a primarily European perspective and talks about eventually moving abroad. "In Europe art is culture. Here, art is money." This said with a shrug, and dramatic thrust of his chin. A gesture not lost in translation.