Daniele Nitti Sotres’s sculpture expresses itself through the choice of natural materials—stone, metal or industrial waste—which are characterised by an energy of their own, and by specific qualities that respond to stimuli in different ways.
By placing and removing elements, as the theorist, architect, philosopher and sculptor Leon Battista Alberti taught in his work De Statua (1464), Nitti Sotres comes to elaborate three paths for sculpture: the path of the hand, intended as the work tool of the matter; the path of the heart, that is the passion which is necessary to interact with the opportunities offered by the materials; and the path of the thought, of the reflection which lies behind the sculptural process.
At Tempo al tempo, Nitti Sotres exhibits three cycles. The first one is Stanze (literally, ‘Rooms’, 2016-2017) and it is mainly connected to an architectural dimension. The sculptor searches for a space that cannot be explored physically, but only with the eyes, the heart and the mind. The room is a private and safe place, a restrained space that encompasses the idea of border: the reference to the present and to the problems that torment us is at the centre of this work, and matter is its essential element.
The second cycle is Pietreferrate (a term alluding to ‘Stones reinforced with iron’, 2018), made of small sculptures whose peculiarity is the development of planes that open and close around the masses, following the dynamic of the stone or opening towards the surrounding space. Therefore, these stones are reinforced with iron using hidden linchpins, creating a further opportunity for dialogue between materials, shapes and space-environment.
The third cycle is Circumvoluzione ( ‘The evolution of the circle’, 2019-2020). After two decades of work using structures and linear and angular constructions, Nitti Sotres has analysed circular shapes, preserving the opportunity of dialogue between materials, shapes and space in the research. By using stones or earthenware, held in balance by circular metallic elements— entire or sectioned —, he creates open and poetic, yet not decorative, sculptures.
Daniele Nitti Sotres believes that two types of spaces exist that are suitable for the development of a sculptural work: “the mental space”, where the ideas seek their “freedom” to formalise a thought-reflection, and “the physical space” of intervention that can be a “creator” or a “container” of a work of art.
Artworks where idea, work, matter and space become one are thus born.
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Daniele Nitti Sotres was born in Milan in 1977. He graduated in scenography at the Academy of Fine Arts of Brera in Milan, where he attended a specialised postgraduate course in landscape design and earned a master’s degree in sculpture.
During his academic studies, he discovered a strong fascination with matter, and in particular metals and stones. This bond moves Daniele away from the scenographic fiction to establish an ever more intimate dialogue with the primary energy of the sculptural act.
He currently lives and works in Milan where he is a professor of plastic, sculptural and scenoplastic disciplines.
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