Karim Ghidinelli

Karim Ghidinelli was born in Brescia, in northern Italy. His work uses a central iconic image, that of a finger imprint. His mixed media abstracts are reflections on our attitudes to identity, which Ghidinelli believes we should espouse while exploring its provenance and transference.

At age eleven his family began to travel for extensive periods of time, no longer recreationally. They moved to Guinea Bissau, where they lived for a period of fourteen months. Karim returned to Italy where he continued attending regular school, though his language skills had been much improved by the tempering experience. His views of the world began to change.

After a period of about one year, Ghidinelli and his family moved again, this time to Ethiopia. He lived in Addis Ababa for more than two years. Here he began to understand his passion for art, and started to read social symbolism - much clearer then he ever could in the pampered society of Italy. In Ethiopia Karim began attending English school, which allowed him to interact with students from a multitude of cultures, religions, races and nationalities.

"My work is based upon passage, mark, and assurance. Identity is naturally a part of the evolutionary process of the passage; the mark is embodied by my distinctive trace on the page. As my work documents the passage of others, it simultaneously assures me of my own journey."

After Ethiopia Ghidinelli returned to Italy, where he attended The International School of Milan. Milan represented a necessary transition; though Ghidinelli was catapulted into a bourgeoisie environment he was not used to, he observed and learned. After little more than a year he left again, headed for the Southern African country of Namibia.

In Windhoek, the capital, he lived for over two years and completed his high school education at St. Paul’s College, a strict catholic school, which presented a set of unexplored realities. Unable to anchor himself to a solid base, Karim departed Namibia and went back to Italy, though only for a short while; in the summer of 1995 he moved to London, attending the Chelsea College of Art and Design.

"The mutation from print, to portrait, to metal, oil or collage represents the myriad of influences I draw upon when composing my thought. Being the living testament of an eclectic path, it is impossible for me to ignore the possibilities that surround me. My eye reads them all as one."

Another year went by and Ghidinelli moved once again, this time his travels took him to Savannah, in Georgia. Here he completed his undergraduate and graduate studies in painting. Karim Ghidinelli paintings has been exhibited across the world - notably in London, New York, Kuwait, Milan and Montreal.

"The work needs to achieve a political identity and needs to express its provenance or dissidence, as life constantly reminds us of the inevitability of politics. The piece is never concluded; rather it symbolizes the continuation of a phase, from myself to the public, from my interpretation to yours. Through its exposure the work obtains necessary nutrients, indispensable for further creation and maintaining the link."