Am Gorlitzer, 2025

Colored pencil, acrylic, and walnut ink on primed mixed media paper 50cm x 97cm

Francesca Rosati is an Italian-American painter based in Vienna. Francesca works primarily with oil, acrylic, collage, colored pencil, and textile. Deeply connected to Europe, her work often references antiquity and nature. Recently, she has focused on capturing the habitual and overlooked moments of daily life. Capturing fleeting interactions on public transportation and observing items such as matchboxes and butter wrappers – the act of depicting these subjects aims to encourage ‘a slow down’ to appreciate the small details of daily life.

During her residency at GlogauAIR, Francesca has taken an interest in the melancholic nature of a German winter. She aims to capture the contrast of the romantic cobblestone streets that surround the sleeping swans of the canals, framed by the bare trees and graffitied surfaces. The city is much like a graveyard – a museum of overgrown and unattended memorials – and “Am Gorlitzer” is a mixed-media drawing dedicated to this idea. Her process consists of first priming the paper with a vibrantly colored gesso. She then drafts the scene using colored pencil and walnut ink. These mediums work wonderfully on top of the primed paper because they highlight the initial brushstrokes of the piece. The colored pencil allows for a layering and unearthing at the same time — an act that mirrors her own story, serving as an evolution and a reminder of where she came from.