Collection: Adriano Manocchia

"My paintings are my emotions; I paint what excites me. It is that incessant search for the visually stimulating that makes this voyage fascinating. While painting places I’ve observed, I enhance my images through compositional means, bringing them closer to ideals upheld in a bygone age of painting. I leave the complexity of life behind in my work. I’m perhaps searching for a time now long gone in our world. If I can transpose these emotions in a painting, I’ve accomplished what I set out to do”

Born in New York, Adriano Manocchia received his Bachelors degree from Pace University in New York City. After graduating, he spent twelve years as a photojournalist traveling the world covering news events. In 1984, Adriano turned his attention to fine art, adopting the painting techniques of the Old Masters and quickly received the attention of critics worldwide. A number of awards and special projects marked his recognition in the traditional art field as a foremost contemporary artist.

Through the years the technique and subject matter of his paintings have evolved. His earlier detail renditions of wildlife and angling scenes have given way to a more painterly style. Water with its sounds, colors, movements, had always awakened a deep response in him. Now it is the study of that water, always different, challenging, elusive, that inspires his creations.  One of the predominant responses to his paintings is that sense of peacefulness collectors feel while viewing them.

It is nostalgia, instead, which permeates Adriano’s still life paintings. He is a story-teller that uses a paint brush to inspire emotions. An old creel, a bamboo rod, a creased photo, are all elements of a story which each collector can interpret and shape in his or her own way. It is a trip down memory lane where highly detailed and vibrant objects become intrinsic elements of those recollections, only to fade away along the edges in the dark background, just like fuzzy details of an old memory.

Adriano was recently inducted into the Fly Fishing Hall of Fame at the Catskill Fly Fishing Museum in Livingston Manor, New York for his 40 plus years of capturing sporting art on canvas and for his passion for conservation efforts. He was also inducted in 2010 into the Fresh Water Fly Fishing Museum in Hayward, Wisconsin and selected as the Sporting Artist of the Year for 2024 by the Connecticut River Salmon Association. His paintings graced magazines around the world like Gray’s Sporting Journal, Sporting Classic, Sports Afield, Fly Fod & Reel, Fly Tyer. Adriano’s work is in major private collections here and abroad. Today, when not in his studio Adriano spends time with his antique cars and fishing the Battenkill a few miles from his farm in upstate New York.