Giorgio Coen Cagli: Art Reportage for "Public and Confidential"- Aakash Nihalani

Here's a selection of pictures taken for "Public And Confidential", the great project of Wunderkammern dedicated to street art, with the fourth artist invited to Rome, Aakash Nihalani

Wunderkammern is a gallery based in Torpignattara, Rome, that "exhibits a genre of work inspired by the relation between the personal and the collective space. The gallery and its represented artists explore themes related the marvellous, the paradox, the connection between the inside and the outside, the conventional and the unaccepted, privacy and voyeurism, with a strong influence by 'relational art' and 'public art"

http://www.wunderkammern.net

"Born in Queens (USA), but of Indian heritage, Aakash Nihalani (1986) utilizes colored, oftentimes fluorescent, adhesive tape to create simple geometric shapes that simulate three-dimensionality and function as deceptive continuations of the surrounding adjacent structures. Once the optical illusions are created, it is the human body that brings them to life, achieving a visual effect that is surprising and unexpected each time. In Aakash’s installations people interact with the geometry as they would with 3-dimensional depth and perspective, as both players and as spectators alike.

Nihalani explains: “Most artists use a canvas in order to paint on a limited surface. Like a painter I start with the canvas, but I also explore the ways to sculpt and paint around it, using it as a visual object in and of itself. These paintings, like the majority of my work, are created with a specific point of view – a frontal one – where the illusion exists and the shapes seem to come to life.”

http://www.aakashnihalani.com

All Pictures © Giorgio Coen Cagli- Courtesy Wunderkammern