It is twilight on a mountainside overlooking the bay of Cala San Vicente. In the embers of the dying day, the last rays of sun are reflected on a golden, pale-faced moon which hovers, saturnine, amid a celadon sea of abstract swans, terracotta nudes and gleaming mythological symbols. In his trademark paint-splattered jeans and hand-scrawled blazer, a wild-eyed Carlito Dalceggio is adding the final flourishes to a painting from a series entitled Tierra Desnuda. One of a collection of pieces created in the far north of Ibiza during April, the painting will form part of the artist’s upcoming exhibition at Santa Gertrudis’s Estudio Laterna.
Born in Quebec to an artistic, intellectual, Italian immigrant family – both his parents were university lecturers and his grandfather a monument carver – Carlito Dalceggio is a painter, sculptor, musician, poet and filmmaker whose intense and immersive approach embodies the essence of a modern-day Renaissance man. Channeling spiritual and cultural influence into a raw kaleidoscope of expression, he is a modern-day seeker, an ardent visionary whose journey through the realms of art has become a profound and philosophical exploration of identity, spirituality and the duality of the human experience.
While Canadian by birth, Dalceggio eschews cultural categorisation in favour of a fireside seat at the hearth of humanity. ‘I don't believe in frontiers. I am a child of the cosmos. I believe that peace will return to earth when the only frontiers we know are those of the soul.’ A self-proclaimed nomad, it is Dalceggio’s global and cultural explorations that have come to best define his life and work. ‘I have never really felt I was from anywhere. I am a spiritual being. I'm deeply connected with the original gypsies from India. I have lived with the Maasai tribespeople. The Native Americans tell me that Mohawk blood runs in my veins and Mexico is the home of my heart. I am a totally free spirit, devoted only to my art.’ It is arguably his connection with the planet’s indigenous cultures that has informed Dalceggio’s instinctive cycle of moving his studio every two years – Thailand, Paris, Laos, New York, Ibiza. While this chaotic, cross-cultural caravanserai makes for a remarkable narrative, he is hesitant to romanticise the notion - ‘people fantasize about the real gypsies, the ones in constant flux. I think perhaps they are just searching for the one thing they have never found – a place to call their own’.
'I don't believe in frontiers. I am a child of the cosmos. I believe that peace will return to earth when the only frontiers we know are those of the soul.'
Regardless of country or continent, to spend time in any one of Dalceggio’s ethereal, evocative, ever-evolving studios is to be drawn into a multifaceted universe of spirituality and mysticism, a sensual wonderland where the societal norms of the modern world – clocks, mealtimes, chairs – cease to exist. ‘Comfort is not a concept that I am in touch with. When I paint, it is an exchange with the universe. I am simply a tool for my art. When I am pure in my intention and don’t stray from my path, I can enter a dream state, another dimension. It is then that the universe responds with inspiration.’
While Dalceggio’s work delves deeply into esoteric themes, drawing inspiration from ancient philosophies, shamanic traditions and mystical experiences, it is his repeated use of talismanic symbolism – swans, owls, women, suns – combined with his own, hand-scribbled poetry that creates a kind of modern mythology, or what the artist himself calls a ‘manifesto for the liberation of the spirits’. In Ibiza, his multimedia collaborations with the Kurdish singer and musician Bahramji have resulted in a series of works on paper that fuse cobalt-blue Arabic calligraphy with primitive pencil sketches. The relationship between the two artists has become an alchemy of sorts, a mirroring dance of yin and yang underpinned by a deep sense of reverence for the ritual of co-creation. As the sun sets over Dalceggio’s incense-scented, open-air studio, it is Bahramji’s haunting vocals that drift across the pinewoods to the sea.
The relationship between Dalceggio and Bahramji is an alchemy of sorts, a mirroring dance of yin and yang underpinned by a deep sense of reverence for the ritual of co-creation.
It is perhaps this instinctive connection to humanity in all its guises that has informed Dalceggio’s dedication to social activism and public art. A road trip in Mexico with a filmmaker in a Ford Econoline brought street art to remote rural communities. In Tanzania, 50 local children were united in the painting of an ancient monastery. In the wilds of Alaska, a call to arms from environmental non-profit Union of Nature resulted in the painted sails of a warrior vessel on a climate mission. Perhaps closest to his heart, Dalceggio’s long-standing community art academy in Mexico City provides the tools for underprivileged children to explore their creativity. ‘Art is an emotional language,’ he muses. ‘It knows no fear and no ego. Art carries the archetypes of humanity, of the planet, of all things. It is a continuum. To create art is our birthright.’
In return for his craft and his commitment, Dalceggio receives what he terms ‘unbearable kindness’ from the communities he is transiently adopted into. It is not hard to see why they would want him to stay: in a world that seeks to compartmentalise and label its artists, the mercurial, magnetic Dalceggio defies easy classification. He is a maverick, a truth seeker, a terranaut charting his own course through the limitless expanse of human creativity. His art speaks to the universal human experience. In an age of division and upheaval, Carlito Dalceggio takes us on a deep dive into the origins of the unknown, to a place of trust, of hope and of unconditional love, where the barriers between the many worlds dissolve. It is the promised land, the spirit realms, the ashes of the great fire of the ego. And it is the birthplace of freedom.
In an age of division and upheaval, Carlito Dalceggio takes us on a deep dive into the origins of the unknown, to a place of trust, of hope, and of unconditional love, where the barriers between the many worlds dissolve. It is the promised land, the spirit realms, the ashes of the great fire of the ego. And it is the birthplace of freedom.
