Michael Vincent

Michael Vincent is the artistic identity of a remarkable collaboration between painters Michael Maselli and Vincent Silvano. The two artists met by chance at a blues guitar jam session in Los Angeles and discovered an instant connection. They soon learned their grandfathers both came from the same province outside Rome, Italy, and that both were born and raised on the East Coast. Even their wives had lived blocks apart in New York City during the 1980s.
In the past decade, Silvano has received tremendous recognition for his life-size murals. He studied at the Cal Art Institute and Art Students League. Maselli has been actively involved in tandem painting and drawing sessions with several well-known contemporary artists over the past 15 years, though he considers himself self-taught.
While their individual styles differ—Silvano leans toward refined classical technique while Maselli paints in an exuberant abstract-impressionistic style—they share a similar aesthetic vision and affection for figurative painting. Together they are highly skilled in their use of chiaroscuro, an Italian term describing contrast between light and dark, to achieve a sense of three-dimensionality. Their heavily textured paintings are modeled after the old masters, beginning with drawings in pastel pencils that are slowly built up. The result is luminous and captivating work that fuses modern impressionism with classical technique. Michael Vincent is represented by Park West Gallery.