red ronnie

I love people that are worthy of what they create. When you have an idea of an author it hardly ever matches up with his work, his art, his creation. So you feel deceived, even swindled. This is the reason behind the saying “it’s better not to meet your idols: they will disappoint you”.

I met musicians who made me regret having loved their songs, authors who struck me as being narrow-minded and limited, although their works had moved me. And every time I asked myself: “How can it be? How could this person have created such a beautiful thing?” And if I wanted to recreate the same emotions I had to forget the author as a person. But the damage was done and the magic had gone. Suddenly pretence was the only thing I could see. Because, I think, showing two opposite personalities means being fake.

I love clarity, cleanness, coherence, I love to feel that I’m looking in the eyes of someone who’s exactly who I think he is.

This is the reason why I’ve always liked Andy, both as a musician and as an artist. Because when he plays, he moves exactly in accordance with the music coming out from his instrument and when he paints he’s like a character out of one of his pictures.

I love colours and he uses fluorescent ones. The same colours he has on his eyes and hair.

Since I was a child I’ve always dreamt of the world of comics. Andy’s pictures are stories summarized in a snapshot. They portray a magic world, where every character and every single thing seems to be frozen in the very moment they’re giving the best of themselves. There’s sweetness in his pictures. His painted images can inspire a peaceful happiness, even when his transformism is deliberately disturbing. You can clearly find traces of his DNA in his pictures. You can see the eyes of David Bowie, the icy features of Kraftwerk, the theatrical gestures of Gavin Friday and his Virgin Prunes, the infantile world of Fiorucci, the electronics of John Foxx and his Ultravox. But, most of all, in Andy’s pictures you can see Andy with his simple and honest coherence.

The great painter William Congon once said to me: ”I’m my picture, the picture paints me”. This rarely happens. Andy’s pictures paint Andy.

Red Ronnie