Carmelania Bracco on the Inextricable Link Between Art and Pain

In a philosophical essay published on Artribune, writer and artist Carmelania Bracco (b. 1997) argues that pain is the essential root of all art, distinguishing artists from others. Bracco, a graduate of the Accademia di Belle Arti di Foggia (2018) and currently studying in the Biennio di Decorazione Arte Ambientale, contends that while everyone experiences pain, artists uniquely transform it into creative expression. She describes the artist as a buffalo that can swerve and fall, unlike the locomotive-like trajectory of ordinary life. Art, she writes, is the only way to never arrive while never staying still—a continuous mixing, expanding, and experimenting without reaching a final conclusion. Bracco asserts that pain is 'art in potential' and art is 'the experience of pain in germ.' She criticizes the tendency to identify exhibited works with the artwork itself, neglecting the human experience and painful narrative behind them. To bridge the gap between contemporary art and society, she advocates eliminating excessive verbal explanations and philosophical elaborations, allowing viewers to re-experience the artist's primordial gesture. The essay references Alberto Moravia's 'La vita interiore' (1978) and John Dewey's 'Art as Experience' (1934). Bracco calls for art to be seen as necessary, not as a consolation, elite pastime, or tool for exclusion.