Beauty Beyond Belief or Modern Art Catapulted Into A New Unknown Stratosphere?
Publication 17th August 2024: 08:44 GMT
By Samantha Stafford
Photo Credit: Giorgia Shomber
Some experts say Impressionism was only made feasible via the industrialisation of paints and their eventual entry into accessible product categories within the mass market of goods or more specifically “cheap enough to have some fun with”
In an instance immortalised thanks to photography and it’s subsequent materialisation into oil on canvas. The above Tarquini masterpiece now rumoured to be in the process of sale. Truly makes us question all sorts of things, let least modern conventions in the course of ones interior explorative journey in reflection upon modes of appreciation within spacetime. For instance the difference between a more elaborated solid silver replica of Bernini’s Fontana Del Tritone, a tasty McDonald’s hamburger specifically bitten with pin point accuracy to form nothing less than sacred geometry or that what simply falls from an immoral hand or beyond. Here matter, colour, texture and substance all play out into the imagination and perception of each and every interlocutor.
The beauty of, in & from the moment are perhaps beyond measure.
Now presumed to be in negotiations of sale. The Artwork is currently owned by Count Andrea de’ Reguardati of Italy, one of the few people in the world thought to still privately own a Michelangelo, the so called Pietá Di Roma or Pietá di Vittoria Colonna, click here for more (commissioned by the Roman Aristocrat from the great artist in the 1540’s and seen below in phenomenal juxtaposition with Tarquini’s Untitled Meditation);
Photo Credit: Giorgia Shomber
The Count was sharp enough to notice Tarquini at an astoundingly young age, so young in fact the astutely nerdy Brit hadn’t even gotten 100% in his Theological examination yet, or handed in his thesis on “The Evolution of Religious Symbolism From Antiquity To The Birth Of Christianity” at the University of Santa Maria Assunta in Rome.
And the above “Detritus Meditation” isn’t the only Omero Tarquini artwork Count de’ Reguardati owns, he was also quick to purchase the below seated muse (Infinity 8, on the right) one of the first Objet Trouvé pieces the artist ever made at the tender age of 23.
Photo Credit: Giorgia Shomber
When we contacted the Count in order to ask about the forthcoming sale and specifically about the artist the Count responded by saying; I’ll tell you pretty much what I told The Oriental Club in London about him:
“I encountered him almost daily studying relentlessly and I mean relentlessly at a humble little establishment along the Via Giulia (sadly no longer with us). Even when at breakfast in the presence of the occasional beauty or two, the second one, if present, almost always being his dear and loved — endlessly loyal American assistant Georgia Shomber.
However to enable you to fully acquaint yourselves with the true nature of this young man, his morality as well as brilliant spirit. I’ll share a short story revolving around the moment I was able to do so myself.
He was in the midst of preparations for important University examinations, yet a mutual friend of ours had requested him personally for his thoughts regarding a certain Italian politician’s upcoming campaign.
Omero, even though having somewhat been taken off guard and still in pyjamas, being the chap that he is, kindly hosted the occasion and regardless of being in the company of individuals such as an Italian State Senator, member of the Italian Financial Guard, internationally acclaimed directors as well as a small aggregate of talented individuals of varying faith, heritage and nations felt no embarrassment whatsoever.
In fact, as everyone else, he was purely focused on the task at hand sharing his opinion on an array of diverse perceptual methodologies and approaches in regards to the issue in motion, even ensuring he made time to personally help the accompanying waiters and ensure all the help for the occasion had all the help it needed, even serving plates himself when there was not a strict necessity.
I’ll only add:
“Rome can be a small place and I’m sure that his cherished New York based, Yale Landscape Architecture Professor Bryan Feurmann, whom also had the pleasure of enjoying our once beloved bar on the Via Giulia, would agree with me when I say. I’ve never seen a scholar work so hard let alone an artist — to use an American word, the talent was nothing to do with it, there was no decision in the piece’s acquisition, as you say in English — it was a no brainer — and to be frank, I wouldn’t have parted with it, but Mrs Butler along with her associates can be very convincing to say the least. I believe it’s for someone else, that’s how these agents and elite interior designers work, I wouldn’t be surprised if it were to pop up onto the open market however.”
Photo Credit: Giorgia Shomber
In anticipation of the sale, at his historic 16th century palazzo on the via Giulia in Rome (pictured above). Count Andrea de’ Reguardati held a private ball with hyperrealistic fakes of both works of art in full view of the select guests that were fortunate enough to come. The originals being in secure storage facilities, the Michelangelo, in a state of the art temperature controlled preservation unit in Italy and excluding Sardinia and Sicily, landlocked on the peninsula by Italian law—for cultural reasons, while the other, by Omero, produced in Great Britain is already in a free port in Switzerland.
ImageCredit:tiggybutler.com
The sale is rumoured to be to the Interior Designer and former love of the late Tony Ryan founder of Ryan Air Tiggy Butler for an undisclosed amount.
Image Credit: Giorgia Shomber
Although the purchase amount is undisclosed we can imagine it awesome, as the Interior Designer to the stars, royalty & beyond was once asked before overcoming some serious and well publicised financial challenges. How much she would sell the above work she already owns by Tarquini (1 of the 4 Feeling 21’s to exist, made when the artist was merely 21 years of age) and regardless of the now overcome economic challenges, after pulling an impressive smile, the words of more than a million came out of her mouth.
Early in his career, Tarquini reportedly absorbed a piece of counsel from an acquainted art collector—herself the wife of a former French Minister of Defence. From that moment onward, he allowed only a select few works to enter the physical market.
So for official commentary and authentication on the matter, after a few weeks of correspondence with a delightful assistant called Anne. We managed to track down the international artistic sensation for a “Fanta al limone” having just finished a free online Harvard Architectural Imagination Lecture, (click here) and in a 21st century Bernini spirit we caught him doing a David Hockney on his iPad, yet sketching out a skyscraper with what I can only describe as ancient motifs that would have brought an uplifting expression to Vitruvius himself, let least a figure of greatness from our own time, dare I say Lord Norman Foster.
Bronze statue of an athlete from Ephesus cleaning his strigil; 1st century CE
copy of a possible original by Polykleitos
He was on a public beach just outside Rome of which his family has been frequenting for generations with nothing but a few towels, an iced bottle of water and was also flanked by two muses straight out of a Polyklietos textbook, as his American fiancée, Princess Lavinia Borghese of Rome was apparently killing two birds with one stone or somewhat more humanly put, as the Italians say “attrare due uccelli con una fava”. Tanning to perfection whilst simultaneously enjoying an Aqua Aerobic workout with her mother in the nearby calm cool sunlit water of the Mediterranean Sea. After finishing his Fanta, Tarquini would later comment on the subject at hand with humility by saying:
“to reverberate some words I think Jeff Koons once said, an artist with completely unimaginable/global record prices and an individual I admire, but evidently, not as the pornographer he once was and might well still be — The secondary art market has no interest to me”
Swift, precise and irrelevant to the artist’s direction was the gist. One thing is for sure who on earth let least in history has been thought worthy of being inserted into collections that house names from Keith Herring, Picasso & Michelangelo to ancient roman masterpieces of once upon a time.
No-one but Omero and to our great delight, we know he’s just getting started on his profoundly thought out and immensely appreciative journey in the expansion of humanity’s expression through art !
Yet perhaps what should excite us even more so, is whom will be the artists who will eventually appertain to both the future museum & private collections alike of what this man is destined to create still.
Oh life what a joy!
