Man has been making objects out of clay for thousands of years. The creative act of shaping this material is so primordial that it has been used as a metaphor of creation itself. Holding this very ancient capability in your hands makes you feel like little continuers of a millenarian tradition. In my works in terracotta, the main theme is animals. Though remaining in the figurative ambit, I attempt to geometrise forms, which is not too far from what I did in my more personal works of illustration, as for example in Animali Compassati, the series of animals created using a compass. I generally paint the clay after firing it in a kiln. Using moulds made to order by specialised workshops, I then obtain replicas that enable me to cut costs.
In others my three-dimensional works I try to present plastically the idea of nature besieged by man, an inversion of the situation that has characterised the earth since the times of the first hominids until less than a century ago. By assembling artificial materials, like synthetic sponges (polyester foam), and natural materials like wood and cardboard, I try to present this situation overturned with precisely the animal acting as the unnatural material.
This kind of sculptures are often enclosed inside containers. A wooden box, a plexiglass showcase, or a glass case isolate them, something like the dioramas that you find in the Museums of Natural History. Whether this is a protection or an oppression, there is substantially no difference.
