Luigi Ontani

Luigi Ontani, Santa Maria Del Giglio, Venice, Italy, 2011

interview and portrait by LOLA SCHNABEL
All artwork images copyright of the artist and courtesy of Gallery Lorcan O’Neill, Rome

 

Since the late ’60s Luigi Ontani has been photographing, videotaping, and filming tableaux vivants of himself dressed as characters from the history of art. In preparation for his first museum show in the US, the Guggenheim Museum’s 1982 exhibit, Italian Art Now — which also included Sandro Chia and Enzo Cucchi — Ontani traveled by boat from Italy to New York City dressed as Christopher Columbus.
An early inspiration for his artistic impersonations was Luigi Pirandello’s play, Six Characters in Search of an Author, which the artist discovered when he was 13 years old. Ontani recently received the McKim Medal Laureat award from the American Academy in Rome. He also stars in a forthcoming film directed…