Michelangelo Russo was born in Campobasso, southern Italy in 1962, Michelangelo is a visual artist and musician.

He started painting at the age of 12 when he started frequenting the studio of a well known local painter, Franco Iannelli, learning various painting techniques. He had his first solo show at the age of 15.

During the 80s Michelangelo studied architecture and graphic design in Pescara and Roma.

In early1990, after staging several shows in Italy, Michelangelo travelled to Berlin where he felt a strong affinity with the city's artistic energy. He established a studio in the heart of East Berlin, which at this time, shortly after the collapse of the Berlin Wall, was a fertile artistic ground for young pioneering artists.  At the end of 1993, Michelangelo moved to Melbourne to continue in pursuing his career in both painting and music. Michelangelo's work features in private collections all over Australia as well as in Cuba, Germany, Hong Kong, Italy, Switzerland, United Kingdom and the USA.   

Michelangelo is also a talented musician. He has played in several bands in Italy, Germany and Australia. He has extensively toured Europe playing concerts and experimental music festivals appearing on several seminal recordings. Since 1994 he has collaborated widely with musician/songwriter/producer Hugo Race, and composers/musicians Wendy Morrison and Andrew Ogburn amongst others, appearing in many projects, recordings and performances 

 

Jennifer Jabu was born in 1973 in Sarawak, on the remote island of Borneo, into a family with deep seated attachments to their ancestral village communities.  Attachments that have been nurtured carefully and continue to this day.

Jennifer moved to Melbourne at the age of 14 to study and completed a Bachelor in Architecture, a Masters in International Urban & Environmental Management and a doctoral candidacy at RMIT. 

Jennifer’s training brought her to see painting, architecture and sculpture as disciplines that influence, and are complementary to, one another. This realisation, along with inspiration from broad travels, memories of textile weaving in the longhouses of Borneo and strong Iban headhunter traditions have all formed a basis for a fluid view of transforming life experiences and memory to art.

A resident of Melbourne with a love for skylines, Jennifer brings architectural precision and fluidity to her work.

 

The collaboration between Michelangelo Russo and Jennifer Jabu starts in early 2019 during the preparation of “Cartoni containers contained” exhibition at Fortyfive Downstairs Gallery 

Melbourne, August 2019.