The “People-People” works of Pascal Cucaro are essentially abstract crowd paintings — emotionally charged scenes where human figures merge, dissolve, and reappear within dense fields of color, gesture, and texture.

They sit somewhere between Impressionism, Expressionism, abstraction, and figurative art, but Cucaro insisted they were ultimately “Cucaro style.”

The Process: How Cucaro Created “People-People”

1. Starting from crowds and human energy:

Cucaro was fascinated by public gatherings: markets, cafés, festivals, protests, bazaars, circus scenes, and urban nightlife. Rather than painting individuals as portraits, he treated crowds as living organisms.

He often traveled internationally, through Europe, Asia, Hawaii, Tahiti, and the Mediterranean, sketching active public scenes that later became more abstract studio paintings.

2. Building figures from gesture instead of anatomy:

Rather than carefully rendering bodies, Cucaro suggested figures through:

*sweeping brushstrokes

*black contour lines

*fragmented faces

*layered silhouettes

*calligraphic marks

*color blocks that imply heads, shoulders, or movement.

A viewer often first sees “chaos,” then gradually discovers dozens of figures hidden within the painting. Many works intentionally shift depending on viewing angle or distance.

3. Heavy impasto and layered surfaces:

One of the defining technical processes was Cucaro’s use of thick paint application (impasto). Paint was often layered densely enough to create physical texture and relief. Other areas might remain transparent and glazed.

This combination created:

*visual depth

*hidden imagery

*changing light reflections

*emotional turbulence

The surface itself becomes part of the meaning, crowded, compressed, alive.

4. Combining abstraction with figuration:

Cucaro constantly balanced recognizable human forms against abstraction. He wanted the viewer to participate in “finding” the people. Contemporary articles noted that he intentionally “left a little bit to the imagination.”

That ambiguity is central to the genre:

*Are these people celebrating?

*marching?

*isolated?

*spiritually connected?

*trapped in mass society?

The uncertainty is intentional.

5. Influence of Asian calligraphy:

Some “People-People” works incorporated brush techniques inspired by Asian calligraphy and Japanese visual forms. One documented description notes that figures emerged from marks resembling Asian brush lettering.

This matters because it explains why many figures feel simultaneously:

*human

*symbolic

*written

*spiritual

The paintings can almost read like emotional hieroglyphics.