Francesca DiMattio

Francesca DiMattio’s practice is a vibrant interplay of diverse influences, applied in a layered and non-hierarchical manner across her work. Her sculptures, deeply rooted in the rich tradition of ceramics, fluidly merge contrasting references and styles within each construction.

In both her sculpture and painting, DiMattio masterfully weaves together the history and artistry of craft, transforming it from a realm of quiet control into something unpredictable and explosive. She deliberately mixes high and low culture, East and West, and the historical with the contemporary. Her porcelain works, for instance, draw from an encyclopedic lineage of English Rococo, Islamic Fritware, French Sèvres, and Wedgwood, juxtaposing these with mass-produced glass vases, floral tissue boxes, and Laura Ashley bedsheets.

This deliberate juxtaposition serves her interest in dissolving images and materials that evoke an upper-middle-class lifestyle. The making of each piece necessitates a kind of crumbling or breaking down of the very structure of that desire, resulting in works that are both opulent and deconstructed.