Marie Amalia, 1961 | Naif painter

Marie Amalia Bartolini was born an artist. Her mother, Suzy Bartolini, was already well known for her masterful reverse glass painting, and her father, Cyrille Bartolini, is a renowned sculptor.

Studying the fine arts at Paris University, and later enrolling the Beaux Arts School of Paris, Marie Amalia focused her study on the art of sculpture.

But after completing her courses, Amalia decided to follow in her mother’s footsteps, painting in the rare technique, «fixé sous verre», or «painting on reverse glass».

Exhibiting in European countries such as Paris, Bruxelles, Germany and her native France, Amalia's work is also exhibited in the United States by Edward Montgomery Fine Art in California.

Deriving inspiration from fairytales, legends, mythology, and biblical accounts, Amalia's paintings reflect a sense of wonder and naivety prevalent in story-telling cultures.

Focusing her paintings primarily on animals, Amalia also paints landscapes and marionettes.

Playful and fantastical, Amalia's work provides a great escape from the realities of adult existence into a childlike perception of the world that is filled with color and wonder in every glimpse of nature.

First appearing with the invention of glass in Italy, the reverse technique is an ancient one.

Beginning with the most meticulous of detail first, the painting is built up in layers, as each new coat conceals what was painted beneath it from the perspective of the reverse side of the glass.

Amalia brings to this technique her own unique approach by taking the painting a step further, not only painting the frame itself but adding a second border within the painting and including gold leaf, giving the final work an additional flair.

The patterns Amalia created throughout the work add to the playfulness of the piece as the painting takes on an illustrative quality.

Reminiscent of a favorite children's book or an obscure dream, Marie Amalia's work reminds the viewer of the power of imagination and enables the observer to take part in the idyllic world she has created.

There is smell of caramel and the sunday atmosphere.

The childhood memory wraps everything with an aura of smooth elegance.

Pets together with exotic animals tell stories of fantasy, depict children’s dreams and their need of listening to fairy tales.

In Maria Amalia’s magical world the naif painting express itself through the power of colors, and thanks to her technique of painting under glass, inherited by her mother, gains more magnificence.

Images enhance light and joy; landscape changes following an unconscious line that contains magic and mistery of far countries and than it comes back to hug its own origins.

The realtionship with her family, her love for her parents and the art, that she began to share with them, make her artworks a detailed diary of joyful days.

Different kind of flowers and fruits bubble up; angles by horse give us in the distance the gloomy sound of merry-go-round musics.

Calm is everywhere, the past celebrates it and her style makes it at disposal of the viewer.

Marie Amalia, firma di Marie Amalia Bartolini, è una pittrice Francese nata a Parigi.

Vive ad Angoulême dove suo padre, Cyrille Bartolini, era direttore della Scuola di Belle Arti, e pratica l'arte naïf dipingendo in acrilico su tela, ma anche e soprattutto con la tecnica della pittura su vetro.

È anche una decoratrice di cortometraggi, film per la televisione e serie televisive.

L'attrazione per il disegno e la pittura di Marie Amalia, figlia dello scultore Cyrille Bartolini1, Primo Premio di Roma nel 1957, e della pittrice di "fisse sotto vetro" Suzy Bartolini, risale alla sua prima infanzia.

Dal 1980 al 1982, cioè dopo aver ottenuto il diploma di maturità artistica, ha seguito i corsi di arti plastiche all'Università di Parigi, quindi nel 1982 è entrata nello studio di scultura di Georges Jeanclos all'École nationale supérieure des fine arts.

Se, nel 1983, Marie Amalia ottenne il primo accesso al concorso di scultura organizzato dalla Fondazione Caplan Saint André al Centre Geprges-Pompidou, abbandonò tuttavia questa disciplina nel 1984 per tornare alla sua vera attrazione, la "pittura su vetro rovesciato".