Statement

With my work I seek to blur the traditional limits of the separation between high and low culture. The combination of opposite concepts such as chaos and order, tragedy and comedy, beautiful and ugly and the chromatic juxtaposition merge into works understood as a synthesis of an irreconcilable separation. I explore a limbo of significance in which the absence of moral judgment fraternizes with social criticism. The absurd becomes the key to reading a mise en scene where human beings, full of paradoxes, have been reduced to miniatures that present themselves as characters trapped in emptied identities. My works are allegories in which the daring use of color and humor help to resize the complexity of everyday life. Paraphrasing Bruegel the Elder “they are my ironic vision of this crazy world in which I have had to live”.

Biography

Riccardo Nannini (Italy, 1980) was born in a small city in Tuscany, from a working-class family. The need to express himself comes soon, in the 90’s, when he starts to draw his first comics, loaded with provocation and teenage riot. After a decade (the 00s) spent in Milan (Italy) studying and working in design, he moves to Barcelona, hometown of his partner, because of her health problems. A season of deep changes begins. What could be a tragedy becomes an opportunity to face life with renewed energy. He begins to reflect on some themes that will recur later in his work: the debate between determinism and indeterminism, human nature and social pressure. Nannini ends his professional career and enters the underground scene of the city. He lives frugally and takes advantage of all his free time to refine his style and narrative

abilities. It was not until 2014 when he presented the first exhibition under the pseudonym Cane. From there, his style becomes more articulate: the influences of the italian comic masters Andrea Pazienza and Benito Jacovitti, the flemish painters Bosch and Bruegel the Elder and the contemporary Lowbrow scene are noticed. He has spent the last years experimenting in the streets of Barcelona where he has gradually entered into the most recognized street-artists of the city, thanks to his vibrant and provocative style.

Currently lives and works in Barcelona