Eclectic, curious, experimenter, Luca Gentile AKA Bad Mandala never stops. His mind, just like his work, is a web of ideas, languages, images, sensory trails that never exhaust their energy.
Luca, tell us about your education
I have always been passionate about comic books and cartoons and I started to draw when I was a child. When I reached my teen years, I met hip-hop, graffiti and street art. I travelled across Europe and took part in various events related to these fields, and also lived for a while in Berlin and London. I then studied to become a graphic designer, and the combination of the two worlds came quite naturally: on the one hand what I had learned in the streets, and on the other what my professional occupation was, i.e. web design, graphic design, branding, covers and so on. So the project Bad Mandala was born: I combined the most playful aspect with the most rigorous one, to reach computer art.
Why did you choose this name?
Because in my work, like in mandalas, I pay a lot of attention to detail. I love this practice that requires meticulousness and time to draw very small and very precise things. This leads to a sort of meditative state that allows you to go beyond, and to draw things you were not even aware belonged to you. My pieces are often complex freestyle works with no plan, whatever happens, happens.
What was the evolution of Bad Mandala’s work?
I started to draw, with a BIC pen, very large drawings. A very meticulous process involving a lot of commitment. Then I started to simplify it, and make the process cleaner and more natural. I also tried painting, sculpture, paper crafting, engraving. What drives my creativity is following what I like. Some artists focus on the same thing for years, whereas I love change and transformation, blending all the aspects of my life. For example, at the moment, I am working a lot with paper, with 3-D art and sculpture. I love imagining in 3-D. The mask series, for instance, was realized with the sponge used to build floral compositions: I carved the shapes with a very particular technique and then I photographed them. Although they required weeks of work, I wanted them to be light funny works. My aim is always to make people smile.
Your work in very heterogeneous, could you choose one piece and tell us how it was born? We would like to understand how you work.
Let us take for example Mandala Hip Hop. As shape and execution, it is simpler than others, because it is less detailed, but it gives the idea of my technique and my world. I started in the centre and then slowly I created the slice. Then with the computer, I made replicas of the slice to cover the whole surface and I adjusted the margins. If one looks closely it is possible to spot many elements drawn from hip-hop, like rollers, shoes, microphones, sprays, all connected by cables and geometrical shapes. It almost looks like it is composed by computer icons. The effect I tried to obtain was a geometrical ensemble if looked at from afar, but when one moves closer, one discovers all the tiny details that compose and tell its story.
And what are you currently working on? In this moment, I am focusing on electronic music and video-clips, with a friend. I take clips, scenes, green screen bits from the web and realize videos in tune, a bit like glitch art and a bit vaporwave. So on one side there is video making and on the other 3-D art. My dream would be to realize a 3-D animated movie or a videogame. Anyway, I have a lot of fun and I hope I manage to convey this feeling in my work.
