Diving into the Duality of Social Media with Vittorio Bonapace

Q: Your pieces hint at the concept of technology being both a blessing and a curse quite a bit. What are your thoughts on that theme? How does it shape your work? 

BONAPACE: I support technology and I’m part of social media, so I really cannot say I don’t like social media. We are all part of it. Even if sometimes I realize that I’m often scrolling my telephone, like many of us do. I have begun to notice now that even the parents, the older generation, are scrolling as well. I’m very scared about this, and that’s why I try to put all these thoughts and feelings in my artwork– because for me, this is all putting a message in a bottle. There are subtle traces in every piece of my work. 

Q: What types of messages are you hoping to send?

BONAPACE: My hope is that people realize that we are getting too deep into social media, but we all subconsciously already know that we are doing that. It’s not an automatic process, at least I hope we will  become conscious of it. I’ve always been scared about what repercussions the abuse of social media will have on us in the future, especially on younger generations. I love to talk with the younger generations, and I realized they’re actually more open than us as a generation. That came as kind of a surprise to me, because I thought that the new generation would’ve been more closed off from constantly being on their mobiles devices. But curiously, I noticed that this is not what is happening. So it’s not so bad, the future.

Q: In your pieces, you paint a bit of a dystopia, but it’s not totally negative. How do you find that balance visually and conceptually? 

BONAPACE: It’s great to hear that it comes across, because there’s always hope in my artworks. It’s black, but it’s also white. I hope it’s a nice balance between the negatives and positives in society. We cannot hide from these new discoveries or new technology. We cannot say that social media is bad– because it’s not. It connects us in a better way, it connects us immediately, it gives us more opportunities. So, there’s good. There’s bad as well. Maybe in the future it won’t be so dystopian. Maybe it can be a bit brighter and more optimistic of a future than we expect. You never know, because everything is always in transition, it’s so fast. Even artists, they grow up quickly. They want to be published immediately. They want to be famous immediately. They want to get something back immediately. I think it takes time for real changes in life and in the world to occur.

Q: I’m curious if you have advice for emerging artists– for someone who’s just getting started creating digital art. What advice would you give them?

BONAPACE: The new generation is furious to get there immediately, to get to the top level, to make high quality stuff. I would say that the aesthetics and the art understanding comes with time. I would suggest they take the time to develop, to be harsh with themselves, to be very rigid. Go analyze things often, but not to expect to be immediately good at something, because it takes time to get there. It requires a lot of energy, a lot of exploration as well. I would suggest going to museums and going to exhibitions constantly, because that trains the eyes and the understanding of aesthetics. Being an active part of art culture is a very important point for me. I would say it is important also to be explorative, and not stand on the full choices we have made in our brain. So, I would recommend keeping things going in terms of research and on development.

Q: On that point about people wanting to get there immediately– there’s a lot of that sentiment of, “If I don’t explode– I’m not exponential.” Anything that rises that quickly will not stay that way, it’s kind of that slow and steady wins the race concept. What do you suggest people do while on their artistic journey? 

BONAPACE: I think learning to be consistent is important, because sometimes we have to be solid for years and years and years. I see a lot of artists that just jump right in, publish for a while, disappear for a few months, and then come back with something different. For me, I don’t work that way, because you are not really focusing on a language. For this new generation of artists, I think this is a good tip to focus on and find the language first. Find what really interests you, what you’re inspired by in your life. If you go and take time to think about what you are interested in and why, then I think you are most likely conscious of your soul, of your understanding of the heart, and you’ll better your art and yourself and your language.

Q: Do you have any practices that are helpful for you in trying to better understand yourself? Are there any methodologies around self-reflection that are helpful for you?

BONAPACE: I discovered a method that works for me in London, I would say six years ago. I felt like I was creating this artwork for no purpose, because I was constantly doing this image for me– not because I just wanted to create something. One time, at the beginning of creating something, I was thinking, what do I want to express with this?” I landed on a page in a book, which was an art statement page. I remember I saw a few questions and I literally started from there. Even though it was a list of pretty general questions like, “Which kind of things inspire you every day?” They were general questions that I hadn’t answered before. It made me think, who am I? What am I looking for? Why am I interested in this and not in that? So I started kind of a journey, looking for what I was interested in and why– really analyzing myself.

Q: How has analyzing yourself changed your work? Has your style changed over time as you’ve gotten to know yourself more intimately? 

BONAPACE: Oh yes, I started to have breakthroughs in my choices, I would say. It was in that period that I started building my language, because these discoveries gave me confidence. I grew more confident with each next artwork I created because I wanted to develop this language. So I’d add another bit, a bit from whatever happened yesterday that inspired me. I started creating this pyramid. At a certain point, when someone asked me, “Hey, how are you?” I gave an incredibly specific answer, because I started knowing myself in a different way, and knew what I wanted to express. Since then, I have continued being curious all the time, but I also started to nail my interests, my inspirations. It was easy for me to make new artwork, because every time I create something I know where I want to go. The basic idea, the basic concept, and the message, I know how to do quickly. In a way, I feel that when I’m in control, something is not working for me, so I try to mess it up in a way where I will have less confidence with what I’m doing. I always have to be a little bit unconfident– otherwise, I’m not doing something which I consider original.