Gian Maria Tosatti on Future, Past, and the Sacred in Art

Italian artist Gian Maria Tosatti (Rome, 1980), who represented Italy at the 2022 Venice Biennale, discusses his creative process, inspirations, and ongoing project "Il mio cuore è vuoto come uno specchio" (My Heart Is Empty Like a Mirror), a journey across Europe since 2018. Tosatti emphasizes that his work is a dialogue with the Genius Loci—the accumulated intelligence of a place—and that he merely gives voice to it. He cites a vast lineage of influences from 13th-century painters to contemporary figures like Romeo Castellucci and Jerzy Grotowski, but stresses that literature (Hermann Broch, Louis-Ferdinand Céline, Curzio Malaparte, Bertolt Brecht, Pier Paolo Pasolini, Carlo Levi, Giovanni Testori) has been more essential than visual arts. He describes art as a choral endeavor, rejecting the post-war myth of the solitary artist. Tosatti views truth and the sacred as the two pillars of art, dismissing "post-truth" as an alibi for intellectual weakness. He predicts that in coming years society will question capitalism, money, and global divisions, returning to fight for substance over details. The interview is part of the "Futuro Antico" series by Ludovico Pratesi on Spazio Taverna.