ENG

IDENTITÀ is a conceptual painting series developed from my book IDENTITÀ (A Poetry-Making Machine). The book consists of 18,098 pages and is able to generate more than 126 trillion poetic combinations.

At the beginning of the project, I randomly selected words from an Italian dictionary starting with the letters I, D, E, N, T, I, T, À. I chose this method because I believed that identity should not be limited, but free and open to chance. After some time, while continuing to work, I began to question my own understanding of this idea. This led to the method I use now.

Each work is made of eight randomly chosen words, arranged according to a fixed grammatical structure: adjective, adjective, noun, verb, adjective, adjective, adjective, noun. Together, they form a short and surreal sentence, recalling the logic of the Cadavre Exquis. The initial letters of the eight words always follow the same order: I, D, E, N, T, I, T, À.

These sentences produce ambiguous and often absurd mental images. Each viewer forms a different image, based on personal experience, or simply relates to the visual presence of the words themselves. The painting does not end on the canvas; it takes place in the viewer’s imagination.

All the works in the series share the same dimensions and the same visual structure. The words are “nailed” into predetermined positions. They refer to an identity that is imposed, classified, and often internalized. This structure holds a tension between definition and transformation, between external labels and an inner identity that remains fluid and unstable.

IDENTITÀ begins with a critical and poetic reflection on the absurdity of defining and classifying the human being. We live in a deeply contradictory world, where identities are constantly constructed, denied, claimed, and endured. In response, I use absurd language to address absurdity itself.

Daily repetition, a constant structure, and random variation become my way of observing and resisting. I am not depicting images. I am creating visual spaces in which the viewer’s imagination can generate infinite meanings.