Luciano Castelli

Luciano Castelli is probably one of the most provocative Swiss artists, whose career spans over forty years. He came into prominence when exhibiting at famous Documenta 5, where Harald Szeeman took a radical step in exhibition making. Castelli deals with painting, sculpture, graphic arts and photography with an expressive theatricality as critique of a puritan society. Self-portraits from the 70s are marked by gender transformations, glam rock and performative androgynousness.

Together with Salome and Reiner Fetting, he was part of a highly influential group Junge Wilde, whose main feature was the refusal of the highly intellectual and strict Avant- Garde style of the 1970s. He later developed his own personal technique, particularly through his Revolving Paintings, for which he relied on a camera obscura. The result is painted images which can be turned 360° and have no defined upper edge. Since there is no fixed way to look at these paintings, they can be moved and turned as desired. This highly moving character of his Oeuvre is also reflected in his artistic style, whose undefined and opened lines immediately capture the attention of the observer. In fact, it is thanks to this expressive and quickly-moving painting style that Luciano Castelli became one of the most important exponent of the mentionen group die Junge Wilde.


His work has been subject to many kinds of interpretations. The words of the French psychoanalyst and art critic Jean- Michel Ribettes are of particular relevance for the analysis of Castelli's work: "Castelli's expressive theatricality is there to protest at the confusion of a gregarius, prudish, vilely mercantile period". This statement shows how Luciano Castelli's highly versatile approach not only is marked through is painting style, but also in the subtext of every one of his works.

vist artist website