Paul Giuffrida

In the classic Sicilian novel The Leopard, two young lovers explore the rooms of a crumbling palace. In a suite formerly given over to sensuality, they find a wall where ‘the damp had marked the walls high up and also perhaps low down at a man’s height, where it had assumed strange shapes, odd thickness, dark tints.’ Paul Giuffrida, of Sicilian and Welsh descent, captures in his work similar marks left by the passing of people, nature and time through buildings and structures Drawing on his surroundings of industrial decay in Wales and his ancestral background of layered Mediterranean civilisations, Giuffrida’s work comes into being through destructive processes (scratching, scoring, tearing, breaking and burning) as much as the creative (painting, sculpting, binding and nailing).

What we are looking may seem at first to be the surface but in fact it is the revealed interior of the work; skinned, gutted and scarred. The resulting careful constructions and considered textures are collages of memory, of long pasts and long shadows. Although we may be looking for the first time, there is a familiarity to the works. If viewers typically see their own meaning in artworks, then in Giuffrida’s, perhaps, they can see their own histories.”

Andrew Deathe 2006

 

 

1978 Stowells Trophy exhibition, Diploma Gallery, Royal Academy of Art, London

1979 Coming Out, Selected New Welsh Graduates, Oriel, Cardiff

1980 Swansea Branch AADW, Arts Workshop, Swansea

1996 Aspects of Wales, Pontardawe Swansea

1997 Aspects of Wales, Pontardawe Swansea

2003 Swansea Open Exhibition, Glynn Vivian, Swansea

2004 Open 04, Rhondda Heritage Park (Prize winner)

2004 Swansea Open, Glynn Vivian Art Gallery, Swansea

2004 Oriel Davies Open, Newtown, Powys

2005 Exhibiting with Art Matters Gallery, Tenby

2005 Open05, Rhondda Heritage Park

2005 Art Matters Gallery, Tenby, Open Exhibition (Winner of people’s choice)

2006 Open06, Rhondda Heritage Park

2006 Swansea Open, Glynn Vivian Art Gallery, Swansea

2006 Affordable Art Fair, Battersea, London

2006 Art Matters Gallery, Tenby, New Paintings by Past Prize Winners

2006 Art Ireland, Dublin

2006 Cube Gallery, Bristol

2006 Crane Gallery, Swansea

2007 Travellers Tales, Long Gallery, Swansea Museum

2007 Winter group exhibition, Attic Gallery, Swansea

2007 Mixed show Washington Gallery, Penarth

2007 Paul Giuffrida and Neil Clarke, Crane Gallery, Mumbles, Swansea

2007 Gateshead Art Fair Newcastle, Affordable Art Fair Bristol and London,Edinburgh Art Fair

2007 Summer Exhibition Royal Academy of Art, London

2007 New View, Mission Gallery, Swansea

2007 Summer Show Crane Gallery, Swansea

2007 Swansea Open, Glynn Vivian Art Gallery, Swansea

2007 Royal West of England Academy Autumn Open Exhibition, Bristol

2007 Crane Gallery Christmas Exhibition, Mumbles, Swansea

2007/8 ‘Second Helping’ Bordeaux Quay Restaurant, Bristol

2008 Edinburgh Art Fair and Chelsea Art Fair, London

2008 Form : London

2008 Affordable Art Fair Bristol and Battersea, London

2008 The Crane Gallery Spring show, Mumbles, Swansea

2008 Open 08 Mission Gallery , Swansea

2008 Welsh Artist of the Year Exhibition, St. David’s Hall, Cardiff

2008 Royal West of England Academy Autumn Open Exhibition, Bristol

2008 Christmas Showcase, St. David’s Hall, Cardiff

2009 Christmas Exhibition, Crane Gallery, Mumbles, Swansea

2009 Welsh Artist of the Year Exhibition at St. David’s Hall, Cardiff

2009 Affordable Art Fair, Brussels and Amsterdam

2009 Edinburgh Art Fair, 20|21 International Art Fair – Royal College of Art, London

2009 Affordable Art Fair, Bristol and Battersea, London

2009 Chelsea Art Fair, London and Cambridge Art Fair

2009 Open Exhibition, Glynn Vivian Art Gallery, Swansea

2009 Tros Gynnal Children’s Charity Exhibition and Auction, Swansea Museum

2009 Christmas Showcase, St. David’s Hall, Cardiff

2010 Affordable Art Fair, Brussels and Paris

2010 Affordable Art Fair, Bristol

2010 Chelsea Art Fair, London and Cambridge Art Fair

2010 Welsh Artists in Rome , Biblioteca Casanatense, Rome

2010 In House Art at Swansea Museum

2010 Nick Holly Gallery Swansea

2010 Christmas Exhibition, St. David’s Hall, Cardiff

2010 Christmas Exhibition, Oriel Canfas, Cardiff

2010 Swansea Studios Exhibition at Swansea Museum

2011 Cube Gallery, Bristol

2011 Art Matters, Tenby

2011 Welsh Artist of the Year Exhibition at St. David’s Hall, Cardiff

2011 Nick Holly Gallery, Swansea

2011 Open 11, Rhondda Heritage Park

2011 Cube Gallery, London

2011 Affordable Art Fair Battersea

2011 Christmas show St. David’s Hall, Cardiff

2012 Cube Gallery, Bristol and London