Cristiano Di Martino’s works are strongly influenced by his Italian heritage. Born at the foot of Vesuvius in 1989, he witnessed a dark Christian obsession with death that has long been an everyday companion for many Neapolitans. He uses the iconographic symbols that surrounded him as a signifier of sentiment: impressing upon them his own shifting outlook on the natural world and the transience of our human condition. These relics of his memory are melded with an elegance and material fragility to create isolated objects that seem to carry the weight of the world. Their essence – concealed or elaborately enshrined – shares something of the ideals of the past: of memories and how they become shrouded in personal sentiment.
Cristiano trained at the Academy of Fine Arts in Florence. He was a finalist in the 2014 edition of Premio Celeste, featuring in an exhibition at Assab One (Milan) curated by Lorenzo Benedetti, the director of the De Appel Arts Centre in Amsterdam. Over the last decade, Di Martino has exhibited with independent galleries and public institutions across Italy and the UK. These include exhibitions at: The Centre of Research and Documentation for Contemporary Art (Arezzo), The Chapel of San Savero (Naples) sponsored by the councils of Naples and the Campania region, and with the RSW in the Royal Academy Building (Edinburgh) and the Royal Institute at the Mall Galleries (London). Cristiano’s work is held in several private collections including two works on permanent display in The Club at The Ivy, Covent Garden.trace
