Bocchino is inspired by the energy and life in jazz music. She manages to capture sounds and rhythms to marvelous and lively effect in her work, which she has described as “images of sound using paint.” Her tools are her enamels, paints, acrylics, brushes, pencils, and her fascination with the line. Her abstract paintings and drawings translate the compositional, spontaneous and rhythmic qualities of music into a two dimensional form.
Color theory also plays a prominent role in this exhibition. Bocchino explores the interplay between white and a spectrum of blues in the paintings on display, creating different energies and emotional vibrations on each canvas. She explains that, to her, these blues represent “waves, nets, fountains, skies, and dreams.”
New York City galleries began showing Bocchino’s work in 1985. Since then, galleries and museums worldwide have featured her work in solo and group exhibitions. These include
Exhibit A in New York, ArtHaus in San Francisco, Jeffrey Coploff Fine Arts in New York, Campo & Campo in Antwerp, Studio Bocchi in Rome, the Galerie du Tableau in Marseilles, the Millennio Gallerie D’Arte in Venice, the New Jersey State Museum in Trenton and the Morris Museum of Art in Morristown, among others. Most recently, a film entitled “Observer Highway Revisited – New Work by Serena Bocchino” was named outstanding short film at the International Film Festival, Museum of Modern Art, New York City. Bocchino’s work is included in more than 40 corporate and public collections worldwide.
Bocchino has a Masters Degree from New York University. She has received recognition from many institutions, including The Museum of Modern Art, The Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation, the New Jersey State Council on the Arts, and The Trenton City Museum. She is the recipient of grants from The Pollock-Krasner Foundation, Art Matters Inc., and Artists’ Space in New York, of a fellowship from P.S. 1 in New York, and of the Basil H. Alkazzi Award. Her work has recently been selected for inclusion in the Brodsky Print Center’s 25th Anniversary Exhibition at The Museum of Modern Art in New York in 2011.
