Owner and chef of Domvs by Gabriel Fratini at Sheraton Towers Singapore
Istarted painting when I was about 12. My father wanted me to be a bricklayer or mechanic, and my art teacher encouraged me to go to an art school, but that meant I had to study other subjects too. I wasn’t skilled in the academic department, instead excelling only in sports and painting. My family was also too poor to send me to college. I thought to myself, ‘I won’t have problems feeding myself if I learn how to cook’. And so I went to culinary school when I was 14.
After graduation, I worked in Switzerland, France, UK, Italy and Hong Kong. I made the move to Singapore in 1988 to open Domvs. I did a collection of six paintings for the restaurant and we made prints of them as a ‘thank you’ gift for diners. A year later, when Sheraton renovated the rooms, they took 20 of my original paintings, reprinted them and placed them in the 400odd rooms. The prints are now gone, but they kept two paintings, which are still hanging in the lobby.
When I first started painting, I wanted to mimic Van Gogh’s work. He was my favourite artist. But as time went by, I painted whatever I felt like. Today, I paint everything, from faces and houses to scenery. I don’t use brushes. I take the acrylic paint with my fingers and paint. Sometimes, I use plaster to add texture. I guess I’m allowed to explore all forms of painting because it’s not my occupation. If I had to do it for a living, then perhaps I would specialise in something. Funnily enough, while I treat my plates as canvases, I don’t paint food and dishes I’ve created.
I’ve probably painted over 1,000
“I don’t use brushes. I take the acrylic paint
with my fingers and paint.”
paintings, and I don’t know where most of them are as I’ve given many away. But it doesn’t matter to me. I keep the ones I love. My favourite painting to date is kept at my house in Italy. It’s a painting of my grandfather when he was still alive, I did it in 1991. He has passed on, and the painting is how I remember him. ¬