Olmo Gasperini on Being a Young Artist in Milan

In an interview with Artribune, Rome-born artist Olmo Gasperini (b. 1997) discusses the challenges of sustaining an artistic practice in Milan. He critiques the market-driven art system, which he believes pressures young artists into producing predictable, saleable work. Gasperini sustains himself through sales with RvB Arts gallery in Rome and private drawing and painting lessons. He works exclusively from life, painting environments that decay as he paints them, and cites Giorgio Morandi's quote: 'There is nothing more abstract and surreal than reality.' He avoids using photographic references, preferring direct observation. On social media, he finds Instagram useful for visibility but warns it flattens images into consumable content. He recalls a formative encounter with professor Francesca Alfano Miglietti at Brera and a 2023 residency at Casa degli Artisti titled 'Visibile/Invisibile. Tecniche della Meraviglia.' Gasperini's works often feature bourgeois interiors with signs of decay, energy drink cans, and pharmaceutical items, reflecting contemporary life. He sometimes adopts polyphasic sleep to paint by a single fixed light source, as when he painted an orchid over three months before its flowers wilted.