synesthesia
syn·es·the·sia (sĭn’ĭs-thē’zhə)
n.
A condition in which one type of stimulation evokes the sensation of another, as when the hearing of a sound produces the visualization of a color.
Many synesthetes are unaware that their experiences are unusual until later in life when they realize that other people do not perceive things the same way they do. This was definitely the case with artist Carlo Fantin. It wasn’t until his early 30s, when his wife insisted that letters and numbers do not have colors, that he came to the slow realization that everyone does not see the world the same way that he does. For as long as he can remember, he’s associated colors to numbers, days of the week, people’s names, and even faces. It is the association of faces with colors that inspires this show. Fantin has created a series of portraits of people using the colors that he visualizes when looking at their faces, conveying a sense of each subject’s personality through color. Fantin’s process involves the meticulous cutting of images out of many sheets of paper, and then layering them into complex three-dimensional representations of his subjects.
CARLO FANTIN was born and raised in Italy, and moved to the Bay Area in 2007. He has been drawn to various forms of expression, from sculpture, drawing, and painting to furniture and industrial design. Fantin has shown internationally as well as locally. In the Bay Area, his work has been seen most recently in San Francisco at 111 Minna Gallery, The Midway, and ArtAttack SF, as well as ProArts, Slate Contemporary, and Mercury Twenty galleries in the East Bay. In 2016 he was one of the finalists of the Bombay Sapphire Artisan Series Competition and invited to show his work at Scope Miami Beach. His work has been written about in media including The Huffington Post and Hi-Fructose Magazine.