Laurence Caruana
After Klagenfurt, Caruana apprenticed under Ernst Fuchs for a year, learning the Mischtechnik while working as his assistant in Monaco and Castillon. At the same time, his wife Florence Ménard worked as Fuchs’ personal assistant in arts administration.
In 2009, Caruana created The Visions in the Mischtechnik Seminar, a popular painting class held in the Italian eco-village of Torri Superiore, just across the mountain from Ernst Fuchs’ studio in France. After teaching solo for two years, he invited a series of other artists to attend or co-teach, thus forming the foundations for the Academy. During the 2012 seminar, this idea was firmly set in motion, due to the inspiration of Amanda Sage and the confirmed collaboration of several artists who had either taught or attended the seminar.
With the blessings of Ernst Fuchs, the couple of Caruana and Ménard co-founded The Vienna Academy of Visionary Art which opened its doors in the autumn of 2013.
As Academy Director, Laurence Caruana brings his strong organisational skills but also his profound love of Visionary art to the programme. In collaboration with his colleagues, he develops the curriculum and co-teaches a number of the courses. In this way, he is able to share his Old Masters expertise while exploring new facets of painterly creation.
Caruana has also authored several books:
- The Hidden Passion: A Novel of the Gnostic Christ, Based on the Nag Hammadi Texts
- Enter Through the Image: The Ancient Image-Language of Myth, Art and Dreams
- A Manifesto of Visionary Art (available in English, French & Portugese
- Sacred Codes: The Forgotten Principles of Painting Revived by Visionary Art
Website: http://www.lcaruana.com/
Detailed, precise, with a fine line and accomplished hand, Laurence Caruana brings a classical approach to his painting, which abounds nevertheless with fantastic, dream-like and visionary imagery.
As principal instructor at The Vienna Academy of Visionary Art, he brings many of these same qualities to his teaching, urging the student to explore both the technical and imaginative aspects of creation.
Born in Toronto Canada of Maltese descent, he graduated from the University of Toronto with a degree in Philosophy. To learn classical techniques of painting, he moved to Europe, studying at die Akademie der Bildenden Künste in Vienna.
In Europe, Caruana led mostly an itinerant existence, living variously in Malta, Vienna, Munich, Monaco and Paris, while travelling extensively through Asia, Europe and Central America to enrich his passion for different sacred traditions and cultural iconographies. This passion is reflected, not only in his painting, but also in a series of books and articles, such as his erudite study into the ‘image language’ of myth, art and dreams called Enter Through the Image. Caruana also wrote and edited The Visionary Revue, an on-line journal where his highly-influential Manifesto of Visionary Art first appeared.
His art is highly mythological, exploring the interplay of different cultural symbols and styles. Classical in approach, hieratic in structure, his images vibrate with strong saturated colours.
In the year 2000 he received the invitation to work with Ernst Fuchs at the Apocalypse Chapel in Klagenfurt. It was here that he met Amanda Sage and A. Andrew Gonzalez, who were instrumental in bringing him into the Chapel project. More than a decade later, they realized that the seeds had been planted then for their joint Seminars and the Visionary Academy.
 'Psychanodia Ochema' by Laurence Caruana |
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 'Vishnu Christ Avatar' by Laurence Caruana |