For a long time, without ever really thinking about it, I thought, “I am a person who likes to create beautiful things, who has good taste,” but when I tried to understand more deeply what ‘was my real talent, what was my signature, a world opened up!
To explain it, I try to start with this sentence, “beauty is in the eye of the beholder“, is a spectacular way to describe a great truth.
The beauty of lightness
If it is true that sensations and suggestions we have when we observe something are nothing more than our own interpretations of what we see, is it not equally true that they manifest our desires in their purity, bringing out our inner world without any kind of filter or mask?
It seems natural to me to say that yes, our observing shows something sincerely true about us.
Therefore, I think it is very important not only to be able to see how beautiful there is around us, but to go looking for it, as an act of will, to reconnect with a simple and slow part of us.
The will of the creative, by transforming and shaping the elements, can give substance to this philosophy, evoking images of lightness in the material world.
Not the physical lightness of feathers, or the more ethereal lightness of clouds, but the lightness that helps us not to take ourselves too seriously, to perceive the concreteness of life in a lighter way.
These “images of lightness” have to do with archetypes, of Symbols that carry into our daily lives the magic of distraction and leisure, of getting lost with the eye through daydreaming journeys.
Art as a nest
I express the concept of lightness in the shapes I create, the passion I have for sinuous and harmonious forms is as if it allowed me to design ‘carousels for the eyes‘, carnivals within kaleidoscopes.
When I think about what I create with my art, what LampaDani’s mission is, the word ‘nest’ comes to my mind.
The nest is where we are comfortable and safe, where we take care of ourselves, a place where we like to be. I hope with my creations, beyond the harmonious shapes and beautiful colours, I can help shape your own nest.
A nest is simple: feathers, blades of grass and dry twigs which, intertwined by a skilful and caring beak, create a solid and warm structure.
Again, there is a creative and a handful of elements; I have already told you enough about the creative, so it is time to talk about the creation process.
The creation process is inspired by Mother Nature and passes through the use of the 5 elements: Metal, Fire, Wood, Water and Air.
Metal
The metal I use is steel with a very low carbon content, called ‘soft iron’ or ‘fired iron’. It’s an extremely common material and is mainly used to bind other iron; my use of it is quite different from what it was born for! Its applications are endless, just think that as early as 1200 B.C. man has been using it.
As I work the metal I give it the shapes I desire, and it is at this very first stage that the ‘intention’ is defined, which will be the soul of the object, the signature of the creative one.
Fire
Fire is the next element, it allows me, through the fusion generated by electrode welding, to create a single body, to weld and join the details that make up the whole and, in some cases, to mould the shapes.
Wood
Wood, in the form of mulberry paper. It’s a paper made from the bark of the tree from which it takes its name. The leaves of the mulberry tree were used in silkworm breeding (also in Italy, until the late 1940s) and it is for this reason that the paper is also called ‘silk’ paper.
I apply the paper to the structures I have created and painted (with rustproof varnish), then I cut out and finally solidify the paper with a mixture of resins.
Water
Water is the main component of the resins I use; they impregnate the paper, make it smooth, shiny and much more consistent.
Once the paper is impregnated with the resin mixture and the resins are completely dry, the surface becomes washable with a damp sponge or cloth.
Air
Air, the air needed in the drying phase of the resins, but also the air that will be filled with magic, infused by each component created through the creation process.
This is how the journey through the 5 elements of making a LampaDani begins and ends.
The workshop
It’s in my workshop that I can do all this, it is a place in which I move with the naturalness of a cat, creeping into every nook and cranny, between one package ready to leave and another yet to be closed, between flowers waiting to bloom and butterflies ready to soar through the air.
In my place of work, I feel the warmth and welcome hovering above a soft chaos and orderly disorder, the latter of which many are all too familiar.
It’s my little boy’s room, it is my ring, it is my first crush, my gym, my sweat, my toil… but also my greatest pride!
LampaDani products
A selection of our products that can be purchased online
