Ian De Santis (b. 1996) is a visual artist of Italian and Polish origins. He graduated with a B.A. in film studies from the DAMS (Faculty of Arts, Music, and Drama) at Roma Tre University in 2019, and later attended the Department of Media Art at the Academy of Fine Arts of Frosinone, where he obtained an M.A. with distinction in 2021. In previous years, he also trained in the documentary field, honing his craft of filmmaking between Rome and Sucre (Bolivia, 2016).
Since 2022 he has been selected for the competition Artefici del nostro tempo – Creators of our time, organised by the Comune of Venice; his works have been exhibited at the Venice Art Biennale (Venice Pavilion, 2022; Pavilion 29, 2024) and the Architecture Biennale (Pavilion 29, 2023); in 2022, his work ‘2002, foto-grafie’ (2022) won the First Prize in the Photography section and was acquired by Ca’ Pesaro – International Gallery of Modern Art in Venice.
He held his first solo exhibition ‘Dust and Water’ (Fiuggi, 2022) at Bonifacio VIII thermal waters complex by Italian architect Luigi Moretti.
He has participated in several group exhibitions, many of them in Rome. Since 2018 he has been in charge of the creative part of the HPFF – Hacker Porn Film Festival, a queer and post-porn underground film fest in Rome, also under the pseudonym Ian Dexx.
Since 2022, he has been working as a teacher in the upper secondary school, specialising in the Technologies and Techniques of the Multimedia Communication.
education
– 2019-2021 – Master of Fine Arts in Media Art cum laude (2nd cycle degree, 120 credits, 2 years), Accademia di Belle Arti di Frosinone, Italy;
– 2020 – Erasmus Programme, 2nd semester, Escola Superior Disseny i d’Arts Plàstiques de Catalunya, Hospitalet de Llobregat, Barcelona, Spain;
– 2015-2019 – Bachelor of Arts in DAMS – Arts, Music and Drama (1st cycle degree 180 credits, 3 years), Università degli Studi Roma Tre, Rome, Italy;
– 2016 – Escuela de Cine Documental de los Derechos Humanos y de la Naturaleza, Sucre, Bolivia.
exhibitions
2025
– collective exhibition – Omaggio a Zanuso c/o Trenta Formiche, Rome, December 10, 2025;
– collective exhibition – BeFF Film Fest c/o KUKUMU, Berlin, November 29, 2025;
– collective exhibition – Dare, Avere. Oppure Essere?, curated by Sonia Mazzoli, Marina Zatta, GARD – Galleria Arte Roma Design, Rome, April 4-12, 2025;
2024
– collective exhibition – Artefici del nostro tempo – Creators of our time, V edition, Comune of Venice, Pavilion 29, Forte Marghera, Mestre, June 20 – December 31, 2024;
– solo exhibition – ATOMICA presented by Aborsky Produktion, HPFF24 c/o Trenta Formiche, Rome, April 26-30, 2024;
2023
– collective exhibition – Artefici del nostro tempo – Creators of our time, IV edition, Comune of Venice, Pavilion 29, Forte Marghera, Mestre, June 30 – December 31, 2023;
– collective exhibition – Pleasure Dome with Hacker Porn Film Festival, Hyperlocal Expo, Club Zero Pigneto, Forte Antenne, Rome, June 21, 2023;
– collective exhibition – Idroscalo di Ostia – Una Morte Sbagliata, curated by Marina Zatta, Sonia Mazzoli, GARD – Galleria Arte Roma Design, Rome, March 4-20, 2023;
2022
– solo exhibition – Dust and Water, curated by Carmela Albanese, Fonte Bonifacio VIII, Fiuggi, August 13 – September 4, 2022;
– collective exhibition – Artefici del nostro tempo – Creators of our time, III edition, Comune of Venice, Pavilion 29, Forte Marghera, Mestre, December 1-31, 2022;
– collective exhibition – Alloro – Artefici del nostro tempo, Venice Pavilion, 59th Venice Art Biennale, April 23 – November 27, 2022
past
– collective exhibition – Queer Infection Lab – GendErotica, Rome, September 28-30, 2018;
– film festival – XXIII Medfilm Festival, Cinema Savoy, Roma, November 11, 2017.
awards and acknowledgments
– Ex aequo – Visual Poetry – Artefici del nostro tempo – Creators of our time, V edition, Comune of Venice, 2024;
– Ex aequo – Urban Furniture Design – Artefici del nostro tempo – Creators of our time, IV edition, Comune of Venice, 2023;
– First Prize – Photography – Artefici del nostro tempo – Creators of our time, III edition, Comune of Venice, 2022;
catalogues
– Artefici del nostro tempo, in G. Zabotti (a cura di), Padiglione Venezia. Alloro, Silvana, Milano 2022, p. 85.
student films
– witch’s prayer, 2’50”, 2021;
– between heaven and earth, 4’00”, 2020;
– ghosted rhymes, 3’42”, 2020;
– the bolivian tapes, 4’16”, 2017;
– Boy x Mother x Death, 1’30”, 2017.
press
– Dust and Water (Fiuggi, 2022):
magazine – L. Buerti, Liberi e libres, in Flash Magazine Communication, XXXIII, September 2022, pp. 56-57;
art news – Artribune, Exibart, online, August, 2022;
local press – Anagnia, Frosinone Today, Lazio Eventi, online, August 12-16, 2022;
– Artefici del nostro tempo (Venice, 2022):
local tv – TG Universo, live tv, 20:25, April 26, 2022;
local tv – TG Universo, live tv, 13:45 – 20:25, April 16, 2022;
local press – Extra Tv, Frosinone Web, Frosinone Today, Teleuniverso, TuNews24, IoWebbo, TG24, Area C – Quotidiano, online, April 15-18, 2022.