Massimo Scognamiglio ARTIST
Exhibitions in private & public galleries & museums

Born in Rome, in 1969 lives and works in Rome.

Artist, photographer, and digital evangelist, he paints, photographs, and has been exhibiting since the mid-’90s. From 2006 he lived for two years in California, then for a brief period he moved to Paris where he paints, photographs, designs performances, his most famous Rebirth, which took place in 2016 at Place de la République. Today, he lives and works in Rome, in his studio-house-gallery known as Le Petit Atelier.

He has exhibited at the MACRO Museum Asylum in Rome, with the project “Where is the future?”, at the Palazzo delle Esposizioni, also in Rome, with the exhibition “The Shining Consciousness”, moreover he has entered the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art of Vibo Valentia LIMEN ; in addition to other galleries in Italy and abroad.

Massimo Scognamiglio stands as a poignant figure in the landscape of contemporary art, his works a testament to the profound layers of human introspection. Without resorting to hyperbole, it is evident that his art delves into the crevices of mental unease while simultaneously radiating a palpable life force. Scognamiglio’s oeuvre is a journey through the psyche, with series like “Gli Strappi” (1998-2004) which laid bare the raw edges of human emotion, and “Ciclo delle Stanze” (2008-today), where each room becomes a chapter of an introspective narrative.

In 2023 and 2022 he enters the five finalists of the prestigious Exibart Prize.

Massimo Scognamiglio is represented worldwide by Supermarket.

Download the updated portfolio (updated March 2024)

Latest exhibitions & art Fairs

ROME & LONDON
BECAUSE
GROUP SHOW
Dorothy Circus Gallery Rome

BECAUSE REPRISE
Dorothy Circus Gallery London

"With the exhibition BECAUSE - "Perchè Sì", the DCG changes course from its traditional curatorial line, staging a collective exhibition with the aim of raising a cry in the form of art to respond to the absurdity of the world we live in. For this exhibition, the Dorothy Circus Gallery has selected a group of artists with some of the most innovative and independent language in the art world, filling the void of a specific iconography of hyper-modern rebellion and its free representation in art. United in a body of cutting-edge works, the artists of BECAUSE create a new scenario of young and talented messengers of visual art that promote change.

The artists have been chosen for their innovative and daring artistic research, which reflects the gallery's goal of supporting new "voices" in the contemporary art scene and raising awareness about social issues.

Strappi e Profezie
Casa 94 Gallery
December 2021

"A site-specific installation, 30 works on paper and five canvases: Massimo Scognamiglio transforms the spaces of Casa 94 Gallery into a visionary and ironic psychiatric pavilion

Glamorous with a classic touch, a fashion with a pictorial character, in short, visions that unite the atmospheres of fashion and the expression of art. And it is from this mixture that a kind of loop is triggered, a Larsen effect between stage, photography and painting. The author of this short circuit is Massimo Scognamiglio, photographer and artist, whose works will be on display from December 17th to 19th, 2021, at the Casa 94 Gallery spaces, at via Placido Zurla 94, in Rome. "Rips and Prophecies" is the title of the solo exhibition, which presents a series of works on paper from 2021 and on canvas from 2008, turning the two exhibition halls into an evocative and suggestive place: the departments of an imaginary psychiatric hospital, populated by outcasts, clowns, punks, lonely men, and unheard Cassandras. It was precisely the psychiatric departments that were frequently visited by Massimo Scognamiglio for a previous photographic work, which re-emerges in the installation in Rome.

Painful but never gloomy, always ironic and with a special light. (Exibart)

Working on my next solo exhibition 2024:
the big canvases

“We lost everything / The Asylum”
Acrylic painting on canvas
300x200cm
December 2023

Big mouth series, find these works on SUPERMARTEK

“Rooms” Series 2024

CHROMATIC LABYRINTH SERIES. Find these works at SUPERMARTEK

HAPPY SAD SERIES find more works at ATELIER MARLOES MANDAAT

INTERVIEW / DCG

What do you believe to be the role and responsibility of the contemporary artist in society?

As an ar'st, my work revolves around exploring themes related to sexual freedom, fluidity, and the hidden soul within each individual. Behind the clenched eyes of my characters.

Through my art, I aim to inspire people to embrace their true selves and explore their innermost desires, regardless of societal pressures and expecta'ons. I want to encourage people to celebrate their individuality and express their unique identities freely, between fear and desire.

The concept of fluidity is partcularly important to me: through my works, I aim to explore (concealing and revealing) the essence of each one of us.

In my paintings, the message is not meant to be overt. The courage and social rebellion is in the eyes of the beholder.

Nevertheless, I believe that my work has the power to create change and promote acceptance of diverse iden''es, including fluid sexuality.
I see sexuality as a complex and mul'faceted aspect of human identity, and I believe that individuals should be free to express and explore their sexuality in whatever way feels authen'c to them.

Can you describe the relationship between your art and your message of freedom?

At the heart of my art lies the character of Square Smile, a whimsical figure who embodies the ideals of sexual freedom, fluidity, and self-expression. To me, Square Smile represents a pure and innocent devil, a bringer of light, desire, and dreams.

Through the character of Square Smile, I aim to promote a postitive and joyful approach to life and sexuality. Square Smile is a symbol of the hidden desires that lie within all of us.

Yellow heroes, women, men, and fantas'c animals are all characters that interact in my paintings, as an expression of both pain and joy, and always, always, always of struggle and rebellion.

How do you see your art as a tool for creating change and promoting acceptance of diverse identities?

I see the current trends in the art world as a mix of individualis'c, freedom-based themes prevalent in Western art, and a focus on cuteness, innocence, and childlike wonder in Kawaii art, which is a part of the Eastern artistic tradition.

My art lives between these two hemispheres, which are not two separate worlds but rather a singular global flow.

There is a further element of change in the vast and diffuse universe of image crea'on (of which the art world is a subset) that cannot be ignored: The AI Revolu'on.

I am fascinated (and have been using since the beginning) by the creatioon of images through AI and I believe there will be a global revolu'on not only in art, much faster and more powerful than we can imagine. At the same time, this new possibility of creating images will require increasingly conscious creation of artworks. The very process of crea'ng artworks is a fundamental differentiation between what is produced by an ar'st and what is produced by "simple image creators".

In this ongoing explosion of new image produc'on, it will be disruptive themes, the creative process, and uniqueness that will create value and become carriers of messages, supporting the social, human, cultural, and sexual change that we so desperately need. Now!

Pensiero Stupendo
Hawton Space
June 2018

In an intricate world like the one shaped in our century, identity and sexuality also confirm this heterogeneity and the right to exist and manifest without the necessity to fall into predefined categorizations, which are becoming increasingly sterile, discriminatory, and regressive. As often happens, the collective framework evolves while institutions – all of them: political, religious, social – lag behind, unable to recognize changes and the de facto reality, as well as the right of everyone to be and express themselves, provided this does not infringe – and it does not! – upon the freedom and integrity of others.

Tales of humans in a landscape Imago Projects

The American countryside is the starting point... but in truth, it has little to do with it. I love only two things in the world:
human beings and everything else.

Leggi l’intervista su Art Part of Cult/ure

The Magnificent Seven | Punk Aristocracy 

Thirty shots plus one printed in 99 copies; three iconographic clusters; black and white and color alternating from image to image; children who are almost adults and adults who are perpetually children; a tangle of signs and styles belonging to different eras and generations mixed and overlaid; the story of how even the most subversive movements of the past are slowly assimilated and readjusted by the establishment, then sold as luxury products. And sexuality, the body, as the theater of a silent, contemporary revolution. Look at the works published on La repubblica.

Terra!

Hosted by the central editorial office of Quotidiano del Sud, and promoted by the Institute for Historical Studies of Cosenza and the Dodaro Foundation, a solo exhibition on the drama of immigration, experienced firsthand after spending a period on the SOS Mediterranée ship off the coast of Libya.

UNDER - The short film

UNDER

A film by
Massimo Scognamiglio Studio & Irida Production
Directed by
Massimo Scognamiglio & Fabrizio Boni
With
Miriam Consoni & Sarah Jane
© 2017 Massimo Scognamiglio

Mindful Portrait commisions / Workshops & More

Ultime pubblicazioni ritratti editoriali

For portrait commissions write me a pvt msg

The Magazine of Everything

Massimo Scognamiglio is the Creative Director and the publisher of two different magazine: The Magazine of Everything & Stump Magazine (not yet published).

The Magazine of Everything" originates as an artistic work even before being a traditional magazine because it aims to negate editorial intervention; it deals directly with artists – photographers, sculptors, and other representatives of the arts – but with one rule: once the author hands over their works, they lose the right to veto. In other words, the works are recontextualized, analogical associations are constructed, they undergo modifications with overlapping elements, graphic, visual, typographic, and can be mixed with other images, creating a new concept from the initial material. My own works are subject to the same violence. The first issue is entirely experimental, with a variety of themes and surprising sequences. From the subsequent issues, I start with the title and come to understand what the magazine wants to express only after making this series of associations. Unlike a political act, where one starts with a corollary and demonstrates it, the work takes on meaning afterward, following the stream of consciousness between the various works.

Buy your copy here!

STUMP Magazine
Soon on the newstands near you

My Big Fat Street Photography Camera on Street Photography Magazine

A radical and artistic approach to the world of fashion.
For advertising and editorial assignments write me a pvt msg