Recycled fiberglass, lustrous metals, and semi-precious stones consummate in an alchemic process to bear the fruits of Crossing Over, an allegorical collection of artful objects in a showcase depicting urban imagery and cultural dynamism bred by dense urban living. The ongoing exploration by Italian artist and architect, Vincenzo De Cotiis – recently presented at Carpenters Workshop Gallery in Los Angeles, California – examines cultural contamination, cross-pollination, and displacement through a palette of dark monochromes and organic compositions in a raw expression that is as decadent as it is daring.
Comprising a series of home furnishings – among which are seating, tables, lighting, a chifferobe, and wall-mounted cabinets – the pieces remain in constant dialogue generating tension by way of contrast while striking a balance in the liminal space between their differences. This conversation echoes in the artisan’s practice as well, through ideation, extensive research, and experimentation with elements often occurring in tandem with production. Ensuring that the materials curated can coexist harmoniously without diluting their respective integrity is a complex task. Additionally, the physical crafting of every piece requires a high level of precision and technical prowess not for the faint of heart. Each posturing responds uniquely to the next, and to the various techniques employed, necessitating a nimble and adaptive approach.
Take De Cotiis’ domineering, monumental DDC2117 Cabinet, for example. The beguiling black facade hearkens back to ancient materials, recontextualized with modern sensibilities at a domestic scale. Its rectilinear construction is poetically brutalist and functionally simple making it an exemplary battleground for seemingly disparate narratives to clash, or perhaps even find reconciliation.
Other investigations include the more modest Neo-primitive low tables referencing venerable thrones of a bygone era paired against the DC1924 Floor Lamp, which is fashioned from angular neon lights encapsulated in glass tubes then set within a polished, cast brass frame. Noteworthy still is the DC2203B Side Table constructed in an amalgamation of malachite challant marble and hand-painted recycled fiberglass for an earnest juxtaposition that embodies the miring of cultural and material boundaries.
Although a departure from his other recent endeavors, the artist’s signature expression of recycled surfaces remains a connective tissue through his greater body of work. And the recovery of such materials remains the primary creative gesture underpinning the exhibition, later activated by an assemblage of processes imbuing that organicity.
De Cotiis’ modus operandi resembles that of an anthropologist, using this installation as the loom with which to weave untethered cultural threads for the study of human progress and temporal diversity. Inquiring minds can parse the tapestry to follow warp or weft, unbound by any selvage that might stifle imagination. And the artist shows no sign of stopping with the promise of delving deeper into themes of cultural exchange, the passage of time, and implications of technology in service of traditional craftsmanship.
“Crossing Over is a journey, an exploration in search of places that I have seen and spaces that exist in my imagination,” De Cotiis says. “I have pursued cultures in search of symbols and iconographies that overlap with mine. It is a research on contamination. All that is layered inside me, which belongs to me, but above all, what I still have not yet encountered.”
To learn more about the multi-hyphenate designer visit decotiis.it.
Photography by Charles White.
