Domenico De Lucia

Lives and works in Napoli, Metropolitan City of Naples, Italy

Artist statement

My practice stems from a need to investigate the relationship between the individual and the social reality, starting from the tensions, vulnerabilities, and contradictions that shape everyday experience. Through sculpture, painting, and mixed media, I primarily work with the human figure, not as a definitive representation of the individual, but as a space where physical, emotional, and social dimensions come into conflict. The body becomes a surface of transformation: it is distorted, fragmented, layered, or contaminated by matter in order to make visible inner conditions that often remain hidden. Process is an integral part of my research. Matter is not simply a medium through which a predetermined image is translated, but actively participates in the construction of the work. Clay, plaster, iron, wood, wax, pigments, and other materials retain traces of gesture, error, and transformation, creating a tension between control and unpredictability. The works often emerge from personal sensations—precarity, fear, isolation, alienation, and the need for belonging—which are gradually brought into relation with the social and cultural structures that produce or intensify them. I do not seek to provide a single, definitive reading; instead, the work remains open to the experience of the viewer. In this sense, my work develops through the encounter between matter, the body, and the gaze. The artwork is not complete at the moment it is made, but continues to transform through...

Artwork