FEDERICO ARCURI
Born in Holland in 1963, Federico lives and works in Italy. Arcuri obtained
the certificate of Illustration at the European Institute of Design
in Milan.
Federico Arcuri's work focuses on urban spaces, architecture and people in transit, which the artist photographs in order to translate them into a unique painting. The artist accompanies us through the experience we have of others and ourselves in the coexistence between places and time. During his artistic production he has explored and narrated the relationship between people and space, with the filter of a black and white palette, where the protagonists transit in a continuous evolution trying to capture the essence of life against a backdrop of architecture, undefined spaces and metropolitan contexts with an apparent compositional simplicity, which tells of an existential complexity in a completely personal conceptual reinterpretation between the encounter of figuration and abstraction.
The technique used by Arcuri tells a journey of material stratifications that starts from the construction of the canvas and continues with the creation of a plaster base where pages of old books "drown" followed by the creation of images painted in acrylic, inspired by photos taken by the artist in different places and times. The more or less diluted acrylic is arranged on the canvas using glazes that generate depth and dynamism. The final phase involves a "dripping" directly from the tube and the application of colored and printed Japanese paper inserts, using finishing resin applied with a brush.
The artist investigates the difference between "individual" and "person" to understand human identity, through a series of reflections on the intrinsic meaning of the two words. While the first distinguishes the physical and biological aspect of each of us that makes us different in the eyes of others, the second considers the human experience, the totality of emotional, social, cultural, psychological characteristics, the subjective dimension, underlining the uniqueness and complexity of the individual through their own experiences and relationships. Questioning the “Sequences” of DNA, a succession of information, links and maps that speak of “us” and of our being different, the artist transposes the vast and varied human identity into his artistic translation. The spaces, within the works, are sometimes places of the urban fabric, historical and identifying, known, reassuring where people settle in a comfort zone or move in relation to each other, other times they are almost unreal non-places, without points of identity or reference, where the figures leave space to abstraction, in a liquid, universal, suspended, dreamlike atmosphere.
In all the works you can perceive a strong dynamism, composed of discordant elements, but at the same time in perfect balance. It is a visual dialogue between contemporary dynamism and the surrounding architecture. Arcuri manages to fully capture that intrinsic narrative essence of places and people, where the moving figures live in connection between past and present.
Since 2008, he has participated in many exhibitions in Europe, Indonesia and the United States.
Dream Walk
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