The New Era of Painting: An Interview with Marco Paleari, Winner of the 2026 Premio Combat
Between the Return to Figuration and a Dialogue with Art History: A Conversation with Marco Paleari on the Renewed Centrality of Contemporary Painting.
The 17th edition of the Premio Combat concluded with painting taking center stage, as Marco Paleari was awarded the prize for his work Torero spiaggiato (Best life!). This outcome reflects a broader resurgence of painting, which in recent years has attracted renewed interest within the contemporary art scene, particularly through the artistic practices of younger generations.
The choice of winner carries particular significance given the multidisciplinary nature of the Prize, which, from July 4 to August 2, brought together 80 finalist works at the Museo della Città in Livorno across five categories: Painting, Graphics/Drawing, Photography, Sculpture/Installation, and Video-Performance. Within this context of exchange between different artistic languages and practices, the jury, composed of Francesca Baboni, Lorenzo Balbi, Andrea Bruciati, Davide Ferri, Ilaria Gianni, Ángel Moya García, and Stefano Taddei, recognized an artistic practice that demonstrates the vitality of painting and its ability to reinvent itself through a dialogue between tradition and contemporary sensibilities.
Indeed, the renewed centrality of this medium does not simply represent a return to tradition, but rather emerges through a diversity of artistic approaches that reinterpret its techniques, references, and narrative possibilities. The revival of figuration and the dialogue with art history become means of exploring questions of identity, memory, and the anxieties of the present, shaping a period in which painting continues to evolve and redefine its role.
It is within this context that Paleari's artistic practice takes shape, weaving together references to the Western artistic tradition, personal experience, and a subtle sense of irony. His approach engages with the past without being confined to mere quotation, transforming images and models drawn from art history into new ways of interpreting contemporary life. This is particularly evident in his award-winning work, which revisits Édouard Manet's The Dead Toreador (1864), relocating the figure from the dark, confined space of the original painting to a bright, sunlit, almost seaside setting.
Born in Desio in 1998, Paleari lives and works in Milan. His artistic practice moves between drawing and painting, drawing particular inspiration from the Renaissance and Mannerist traditions. Rather than treating art history as a repertoire of references to quote, Paleari approaches it as a territory to explore and transform. Graphite, self-portraiture, and the construction of pictorial scenes become tools through which he connects past and present while questioning the possibilities of contemporary painting.
We began here, speaking with Marco Paleari about his relationship with the great masters, how images from distant historical periods can speak to the present, and the current state of painting within the contemporary art scene.
Marco, your works reveal a clear connection with the subjects, compositions, and iconographic elements that characterize art history, particularly Western painting, from the Renaissance to the late nineteenth century. What are you looking for today in images that belong to periods so distant from our own? And how do you bring these references into the present, transforming them into images capable of engaging with contemporary life?
I look for the best of what I have seen. I remember that, at the Academy, one of the first questions I was asked in painting class was, "What do you want to focus on?" And my answer to myself, in the simplest terms, was, "Art history."
Encountering the works of Pontormo, Rosso Fiorentino, Titian, Mantegna, and Bellini, first through reproductions and then, gradually, in person, followed by painters such as El Greco, Goya, and especially Manet, was what made me realize, quite simply, that I wanted to become a painter too.
The next step, naturally, was to begin by copying their works and then introducing my own self-portraits into them, replacing certain visual elements in those paintings with representations of objects and aspects of my everyday life.
Almost immediately, those images seemed to belong both to my own time and to theirs. And for me, that was already something meaningful.
Drawing, and graphite in particular, do not seem to function merely as preparatory elements in your work, destined to disappear beneath layers of color, but rather to retain an autonomy of their own. What role do they play in the construction of the artwork?
I have always considered myself a draftsman, although I rarely describe myself that way when someone asks what I do, because the term can easily be associated with the work of a graphic designer or comic book artist, whereas my practice moves in a different direction.
Pencil is, in any case, the tool I feel most comfortable with. In most cases, I allow the graphite marks to remain visible until the painting is finished, because in my work nothing is preparatory and nothing is definitive. Each moment builds upon the next, like a chain of questions and answers. In fact, the marks made by different types of graphite often emerge as protagonists in their own right.
Moreover, I am not particularly interested in the idea of a painting in which the entire surface is covered in an all-over composition. I find it more fascinating to think of a painting as a frame within a larger space of creation, where even emptiness has value.
Finally, on a material level, the "clash" between painting and drawing almost always generates formal solutions that I find surprising.
Self-portraiture frequently recurs in your work, even when your presence is not immediately recognizable. What role does this dimension of self-representation play in your artistic practice? Can we interpret these figures as a form of exploration of identity, in which your “self” multiplies, much like Luigi Ontani in his tableaux vivants?
I think it is, quite simply, connected to a certain obsessive tendency I have to observe my own face, which always seems to be changing. For me, there are two broad types of people: those who wake up with a face that always looks the same, and those whose faces appear different depending on the angle and the time of day. I consider myself one of the latter.
I must admit that, ever since my earliest works of this kind, I have been fascinated by the idea of “filling” every character with myself, of taking their place. As Lou Reed sang, “I’ll be your mirror.”
This does not always happen: sometimes the faces are not mine, but in most cases they are, partly because, for purely practical reasons, I am the only model who is always available to me.
More than Ontani’s work, what first sparked my desire for this kind of self-representation and theatrical composition was Pasolini’s La ricotta, particularly the scene in which the actors recreate tableaux vivants based on paintings by Pontormo and Rosso Fiorentino.
In fact, the first two paintings I made were reconstructions of the two Depositions by these artists. I asked some friends to pose in front of the canvas and then traced their silhouettes directly onto its surface using a thick graphite pencil.
The next step, as I mentioned earlier, was to inhabit those figures with my own self-portraits.
What do you think about the current state of painting within the Italian and international contemporary art scene?
I think the obsession with creating something unique, both in terms of “what to do” and “how to do it,” is somewhat diluting and dispersing the fundamental reasons behind painting, which, in my view, is first and foremost a form of testimony.
I see painting as a predominantly physical practice and therefore, for obvious reasons, necessarily personal, depending on the body that produces it. The pursuit of deliberately individual and recognizable solutions often ends up distracting artists from the deeper motivations underlying their work. This is essentially how I see the current state of painting, both in Italy and internationally.
It would be interesting to see a new collective movement of abstract painters emerge and establish itself. Who knows how the figurative trend that dominates, particularly in our country, might implode as a result.
But to return to the idea of painting as testimony, I am not particularly surprised by the current focus on the human figure, given that younger generations are experiencing a strong sense of impending doom, as though we were on the verge of disappearing.
There are, however, excellent examples to follow, and especially in Italy, the emerging generation of painters is in good shape, better than one might think.
What are you working on at the moment? Are there any new series, exhibitions, or projects you can tell us about?
I am currently working on an exhibition project specifically conceived for the spaces of Paola Manfredi’s PCM Studio office in Milan. For this project, I have also created site-specific works that extend beyond the boundaries of the canvas, incorporating materials such as resin and concrete, as well as video installations.
As for everything else, I prefer not to reveal anything just yet, partly out of superstition.
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