Luca Andreatta - El Merendero

Luca Andreatta "Tonislao"
Bassano del Grappa, 1987 – Italian artist
Title: El Merendero
Year: 2020
Technique: Oil and acrylic on linen canvas
Dimensions: 80x70 cm
Signature: signed on the back

Original work by Luca Andreatta "Tonislao", a Veneto painter born in Bassano del Grappa in 1987. The painting depicts an intimate and suspended scene, a figure seated at a table, caught in a moment of apparent everyday life, before a green window and a wall marked by time. Objects on the table such as the jar, the knife, the glass, the cardboard, the pack, compose a contemporary still life, while the human presence introduces a quiet narrative tension.
Among the most significant elements is the electronic cigarette, held in the figure’s hand. This detail, seemingly minimal, introduces in the work a precise signal of contemporaneity. An ordinary, almost peripheral object, it shifts the scene into the present and withdraws it from any nostalgia.
The composition fuses realistic observation with rigorous painterly construction. The intense green of the shutters, the acidic yellows of the wall, the pink traces, and the domestic elements create a precise, almost theatrical color balance. The work does not seek an extraordinary event, but concentrates the gaze on a thin threshold of reality: an interior, a pause, a withheld thought, a fragment of life that becomes image.
The piece fully aligns with the artist’s research, based on observing everyday life, the places lived, bars, houses, squares, set tables, and the stories of people. Andreatta defines his painting as a way to collect signals from the world, let them settle, and then return them through a personal projection of reality. In his interview, the artist speaks of painting as a means to understand his time, focusing on the “thin slots” of reality and on what, although seeming ordinary, contains a strong existential density.
Luca Andreatta has developed an autonomous path in painting, building a personal research centered on daily life, visual memory, and the poetic density of ordinary scenes. Some of his works have been acquired by the Fondazione THE BANK ETS – Institute for Studies on Contemporary Painting, a foundation dedicated to contemporary painting in Italy.
In this work, painting becomes an act of attention; the subject is not idealized, but rendered in its concrete, fragile, everyday presence. The painting sits between portrait, domestic scene, and contemporary still life, with a sensibility close to the Venetian figurative tradition, yet open to modern and Nordic references, from Hopper to Munch.

Provenance: directly from the artist.
Documentation: certificate of authenticity issued by the artist
Condition: excellent, as per photographs.
Shipping: the work will be sent by courier, with careful and protective packaging. Shipped on a frame

Exhibitions:
- Ensemble - Fondazione THE BANK ETS – Institute for Studies on Contemporary Painting
- From Gonzalo Borondo to He Wei - Fondazione THE BANK ETS – Institute for Studies on Contemporary Painting
- IN THE ABSENCE OF PROOF - 3 Hypotheses
- "Andante Sostenuto"
Website: https://andreattaluca.com