UNTAPPED TALENT: CHRISTOPHER BIFANI

WE DID NOT DISCOVER THE UNTAPPED TALENT YOU'RE READING ABOUT. HE DISCOVERED US. HE INVITED US TO SEE HIS GALLERY SPACE, WHICH JUST SO HAPPENS TO DOUBLE AS HIS APARTMENT. BUT IT'S NOT AN ORDINARY GALLERY. IT'S A LIVABLE INSTALLATION; WALLS AND CEILINGS COVERED IN THE DRAWINGS AND PAINTINGS OF THE MAN KNOWN AS CHRISTOPHER BIFANI. TASTES LIKE CHICKEN'S VINNIE BAGGADONUTS TELLS THE STORY.
If this Untapped Talent section teaches you anything, let it be that they are everywhere. “They” being the Untapped Talents. They’re your waiter, your bartender, your bookseller, and now they are your pizza guy. It’s how they pay for the supplies they need to do what it is that makes them a talent.
One of these “everywhere” talents I speak of is Christopher Bifani. He’s a New Jersey native, and the nicest human being I’ve ever met. I’m not kidding. When we went to visit his gallery space, he not only provided complimentary chicken pizza and soda, he also offered the under-the-weather member of our group antihistamines. My own mother wouldn’t do that. (Sorry, Ma.)
Bifani has been making his mark here in Columbus for the last seven years, and he has a significant lack of interior wall space to prove it. Images of all sizes, colors and mediums cover the walls. Stylistically, they range from Giacometti-like roughness to graphic design-like neatness. They all have stories, too. No matter which of the few thousand pieces I’d point to, Bifani knew when he made it, and exactly what it was about. He thinks of and illustrates every detail that may be going through his subjects’ heads.
He didn’t always make images like he does now. He told me it all started after he’d hit some sour times in his life. It was a way for him to deal with everything he was going through. But it wasn’t a fad. Once he started, he couldn’t stop. And he didn’t just make art. He started learning about it, too, by reading up on artists and artwork. His interest is as genuine as his passion.
He’s a huge fan of Pablo Picasso, largely because Picasso lacked a singular style.
“I always knew Picasso was different because he was one of the few that used any style to get an idea across. He was the one where it was ‘anything goes.’”
But Bifani understands that in this day and age, that isn’t the most popular approach for an artist.
“Now artists are like, ‘I got to make a name for myself. What am I gonna do? What’s gonna be my medium? What can I do to become something, in this economy, that is singular and expressive and still me?' They're completely squashing the entire Picasso mentality to go with any goddamn thing!”
Is this necessarily a bad thing? No.
He explains, “We’re living in an age where you’ve got to stand up for your ways.”
Bifani himself lacks a singular, categorical style, and claims it may very well be a major failing of his. I asked him if he ever thought about concentrating on the technical ends of what he does; on narrowing it down to a specific style.
“No,” he says, “because it might prejudice the next image. But I do concern myself with line weight, to keep the picture moving. I don’t have an artistic template. I have a picture in my head or in my heart, and I need to put it out.”
One of the most interesting aspects of his work is the immediacy of the process in some of the pieces. Drawings done on napkins, smeared with cigarette ash to render value. It’s evidence of his resourcefulness. But what if an image comes to him and he doesn’t have any resources?
“I’m constantly bombarded with images. There’s so much in my head I want to make, but I have to edit it to choose what goes on paper.”
Essentially, it’s hard to capture everything he wants, but there’s always more, so it never ends.
“I’m kinda the reverse of the typical artistic way of thinking,” he says.
He’s not kidding. He doesn’t try for grants. He’s content working a job that allows him the financial means to continue doing what he loves.
He doesn’t hang his work strategically, spacing it evenly over a bare surface. He takes up as much space as possible, and he still has more to hang. He doesn’t try and develop a style to call his own, to help others recognize him. And he doesn’t just make images. He makes music, too. And writes. Hell, when I emailed him to set up this interview, his response was written in rhyme.
So what’s next? The web. Bifani is currently in the process of scanning his umpteenthousand images for his very own online showcase.
“Everybody’s images should be digitized. Everything should be archived. And then, down the road, when this shit’s lightening fast and we got liquid plasma on the walls-- Boom! DaVinci. Michelangelo. Pollock. It’s on there to see.”
He even bought a 32” TV so he could pull up his website and see his work on a bigger screen.
“I want a website that allows people to access my music, writing and art. I want the website to be good enough, interesting enough and profitable enough so that the people that visit it might think, ‘Yeah, it’s okay to branch out.’ They may take some inspiration from it and do it, too.”
FOR MORE INFORMATION ABOUT BIFANI AND HIS LIVING GALLERY OF ARTWORK, CONTACT HIM AT BIFANIART@AOL.COM