If you ask her the question, “What is the most beautiful city in the world?” Without hesitation, she will answer, “It’s Nice. The French Riviera is so magnificent!”
It’s so wonderful that it inspired her. But not just any how, or rather, I would tell you quite differently!
With a fresh eye, she colors and brings life to the 19th-century Niçois landscape. A landscape that will never fade away thanks to these canvases!
Some would call it an innovative style. It’s true. The naïve art of Rose is different, infused with “joie de vivre and child-like freshness.” Her paintings are alive. The sun shines. The sea gently slides over the pebbles. If you listen closely, you can even imagine the discussions of the “Bugadières” and the conversations of passers-by in Place Masséna where trams and cars already mingled. A return to the past. Precisely to 1900. A true journey of colors that Rose Calvino shares through her unique canvases.
Nice-Premiere: Rose, how would you describe your painting?
Rose Calvino: To me, my painting is a stylized, contemporary naïve art. I am a painter of today and self-taught. I fell into painting very young. I didn’t attend fine arts school, but I had a good teacher who, unfortunately, died 27 years ago: Emile CROCIANI, my adoptive godfather. He even painted me sucking my thumb when I was 8 years old (Smile). Today his works are on display at the Anatole Jakovsky Museum of Naive Art.
But he wasn’t really the one who taught me to paint, well, at least not directly. I watched him paint. I accompanied him to sketch. He painted a lot in the hinterland villages: La Roquette, Levens… He was in awe of the stories, the ancient smells, the streets… When I walked beside him, it turned into a story; every little corner of the alley became alive… We have to remember everything because all that exists is thanks to the elders.
N-P: What is your source of inspiration?
R.C.: I am in admiration of Giletta’s maps. I have always loved his maps. But I’ve realized that over time, paper wears out, and putting his maps on canvas is a way not to erase them.
That’s why I use linseed oil paint without sedative of the highest quality but I use it in the old-fashioned way with natural drying which means for a large canvas, it requires 6 to 8 months of drying.
N-P: With your brushes, you color Nice, Cagnes-sur-Mer… What was the catalyst?
R.C.: I love my city. I love the French Riviera and for me, it represents my whole childhood and youth. I have always drawn since I was very young from the age of 5 / 6 years. When I was sick, my father would always buy me colored pencils and so I often drew.
N-P: What was your first canvas?
R.C.: My first canvas that I painted depicts the Quai des Ponchettes because that’s where Nice starts. It’s where the boats arrived. It was the only place I went with my parents, we saw fishermen pulling in nets with fish. This place, it’s my childhood but also my youth, it’s where we went swimming, at Castel.
N-P: Your paintings have a particular style as if they were captured by colors and life. How did you fall into your colors?
R.C.: Color, it’s freshness, cheerfulness… You find everything in colors! I also love making my own colors, mixtures too to find warm colors that represent our city of sun and warmth. The Bay of Angels says it all! It’s life!
N-P: Not just naïve art?
R.C.: Indeed, but for now, that’s what I love and that’s what I’ve learned to paint in relation to my view, my perspective of my adoptive godfather’s works.
