Biography

El Nigro was born in 1982 in Naples, Italy, and grew up in a suburb at the north side of the city. He began his artistic journey at the age of 7 when, under the guidance of his father, he created his first oil painting.

From that moment on, he continued his determined journey, experimenting with techniques and materials and undergoing formative periods ranging from graffiti to theater scenography, from illustration to tattooing. After graduating from art school in 2003, he enrolled at the Academy of Fine Arts in Naples where he studied painting.

From 1999 to 2010, he devoted himself entirely to contemporary art, exhibiting in private galleries and museums under another name. In 2005, his work was included in the permanent collection of 100 Artists for a Museum at the CAM Casoria Museum (Naples), and in 2007, he inaugurated a major solo exhibition at the BAD Museum exhibition space of the Bunker Art Division. In 2009, he was invited to create a work for the Airswap project, conceived by Arianna Callegaro and Luca Mazza and curated by Mara De Falco for Not Gallery.

In 2012, he moved to London, where he lived for about five years and began working full-time as a tattoo artist. This quickly earned him international recognition for the originality and innovation of his work, leading to invitations to international fairs and guest appearances at numerous tattoo studios across Europe. He has also garnered dozens of interviews and publications. He returned to Italy in 2017 but slowly resumed exhibiting in 2021, where he participated at the Art&More by Glo project, curated by the communications agency Question Mark, where he was asked to create a 30x11-meter painting on PVC placed on the pavement of the Caracciolo seafront in Naples.

His most recent exhibition is a group show from FIGURATIVAS Prize at Meam Museum in Barcelona, where he earned an Honorable Mention. To date, his work addresses themes such as parental trauma, memory, solitude and non-belonging, exploring the emotional fragilities of our times starting from a personal and autobiographic perspective.

SINS OF MY FATHER series

The *Sins of My Father* series is an intense exploration of family dynamics, where the artist stages a universe in which traumas are not necessarily linked to direct abuse, but derive from a more subtle and, sometimes , invisible, left by the parental relationship. The "sins" to which El Nigro refers are not acts of explicit violence, but the effect of a distorted love, of unspoken expectations, of unfulfilled dreams and, perhaps, even of good intentions which, however, end up creating an emotional misalignment between parents and children. This misalignment, although not physically visible or traumatic in the strict sense, generates a disturbing psychological and social metamorphosis in the children, who become werid "hybrid" beings, a mix of what they are and what they should have been. In this series the artist does not judge parents, but analyzes how their actions and omissions have lasting effects on their children. The paternal or maternal figure is not seen as a threatening shadow, but as an entity that, even in its love and good intentions, can produce a sense of incompleteness and disconnection in children. The hybridization of the latter, therefore, is the consequence of a continuous tension between the desire to be oneself and the need to adapt to family models that do not allow authentic personal growth. These children, now aged adults, although they appear normal at first glance, carry within themselves an invisible fracture that makes them strangers, towards their parents, society and towards themselves. El Nigro's aesthetics, while characterized by a dark atmosphere, is not devoid of beauty. His vision of the hybrid, of the different, is something that, while disturbing, also stimulates a reflection on the complexity of the human being. The artist creates a visual language that tells of the incomplete, the fragmented and the unresolved, in a world where the search for oneself is a constant struggle against the expectations of others and the invisible scars left by the past.

Selected Exhibitions:

Upcoming:                                                                                                                                                      PORTRAIT 2026 / Czong Institute for Contemporary Art (CICA Museum) / Korea (May - June 26)

Current:                                                                                                                                                    FIGURATIVAS / Meam Museum / Barcelona / Spain (Oct 25 - Jan 26)

2023  MALACARNE / curated by Reverse Art / Museum of Anthropology / Napoli
2022  FIENDS OF THE DARK III / WOWxWOW Gallery / Scotland (UK)
2021  ART&MORE by Glo / curated by Question Mark / Lungomare di Napoli
2014  MINIATURE INK / Atomica Gallery and Things&Ink Magazine / London
2014  AGAIN! / AKA London / London
2013  GROUP SHOW / AKA London / London
2010  LUMEN / Complesso Monumentale di Santa Sofia / Salerno
2009 AIRSWAP / Not Gallery / curated by Mara De Falco / Napoli
2008 CONTAINER / curated by M. De Falco and Not Gallery / Napoli
2007 AFTER URBAN / University of Pennsylvania, PA / USA
2007 CRUEL AND ALLPOWERFUL KING / BAD Museum / Napoli                                          2006 RENCONTRES INTERNATIONALES / Paris -Berlin                                                                                    2006 TEMPORARY CITIES / National Centre for Contemporary Arts NCCA / Moscow
2006 BIENNALE ADRIATICA ARTI NUOVE / San Benedetto del Tronto (AP)
2005 HYPE / Assab One - Hype Gallery / Milano
2005 ARCHEO DOC FEST / Villa Campolieto / Ercolano (NA)
2005 100 ARTISTS FOR A MUSEUM / CAM Museum / Napoli
2005 DIPTYCHS / Spazio Arte Gallery / Napoli
2003 SELECTED ARTISTS / Premio Arte Mondadori / Museo della Permanente / Milano