Francesco Arena

Francesco Arena was born in Torre Santa Susanna, Brindisi, in 1978, now he lives and works in Cassano delle Murge, Bari.

Arena starts from history to create his works, in particular from the political and social events that have characterized the recent past. Episodes, which have often been hidden or silenced, take on new life thanks to the synthetic and metaphorical forms of his sculptures.

Francesco Arena’s research is centered around ways of thinking about temporality, questioning the notion of history, by revealing irruptions in the course of things that seem to conform to a linear development marked by causes and effects. The historical and the personal are constantly intertwined in the artist’s work in the representation of historical events based on a factual relationship with himself. We frequently encounter the use of the artist’s anthropometric data (such as weight, body mass, height, distance from his eyes to the floor), acting as tangible figures to quantify history.