Marco G. De Angelis (Rome, 1978) conjures images that waver between presence and disappearance, form and formlessness. Trained as an architect, his work translates structure into something far less rigid—figures lost in mist, statues eroded by time, plants encased in frost, and faces blurred into the delicate haze of memory. His compositions exist in a state of reverie, where materiality is both tactile and intangible, dissolving before the eye like a half-remembered dream.
His artistic language unfolds across multiple themes: monolithic, spectral figures emerging from fog; organic elements suspended in crystalline stillness; portraits softened into a cinematic, otherworldly glow. Whether sculptural or figurative, his works are bound by an ethereal sense of light and atmosphere—echoing the softness of Vermeer’s interiors, the sculptural poise of classical statuary, and the ghostly allure of vintage fashion photography.
An early adopter of AI tools like Stable Diffusion, De Angelis refuses passive generation, instead bending the medium through layered interventions—erasing, reshaping, and sculpting light itself. His work does not seek to separate the digital from the human, but rather to blur the distinction entirely, allowing presence to linger in the in-between. With each piece, he invites us into a space where time slows, edges fade, and the boundaries of reality and reverie dissolve.
His method is not one of mere AI generation, but a meticulous process of iteration, layering, and hand-crafted, physical color intervention. His portraits, particularly his reinterpretation of Girl with a Pearl Earring, invert the familiar while preserving the timelessness of classical representation. His samurai series, meanwhile, blends the aesthetic precision of Japanese craftsmanship with his signature approach to form—merging the past with the modern, and in doing so, relaying how digital tools can expand the boundaries of visual time.
As digital art evolves, so too does the conversation surrounding its legitimacy, intent, and emotional resonance. For De Angelis, the answer lies less in rigid boundaries between human and machine but other, their seamless interplays. Our discussion delves into his personal influences, his studies and trajectory from architecturally painting-informed early work, to a focus on portraiture, and how he continues to push the boundaries of what digital art can be—melding the weight of history with the possibilities of the present.
JB
Back in 2022, I was first drawn to your work because I came across your Vermeer piece, which is stunning. You stuck with the Vermeer theme and eventually created a gorgeous reinterpretation of Girl with a Pearl Earring. We’ll come back to all of this, but for now, let’s start not with my beginning of discovering your work but instead with your own beginning. Could you share insights into your early life and how it influenced your journey into the arts? What initially drew you to the world of art, of which architecture is often called the ‘mother of all artistic endeavors’?
MD
My early life was probably not different from the average experience of any ‘good-at-drawing’ kid. In highschool I was hooked by the cover artworks of heavy metal records, which were amazing, and often copied them with pen and paint. There was not much to do at the time when you were alone other than playing videogames, listening to music, and doodling. I mean, there were not smartphones around. I had a PC, a 386 I believe, with a staggering 80mb of hard drive—but it was good to play and little else. I still remember the headaches inflicted by the cathodic monitor. Well meanwhile, with time I learned through my father that my family featured draftsmen, architects, painters and woodwoorkers for like 300 years.
One of our earliest known ancestors frescoed the interiors of Galleria Borghese in Rome in the eighteenth century, the place where Bernini’s sculptures are now exhibited. This made me so proud, you know. My first real contact with modern art was some years later when I started to work in an architecture office before my graduation. The guys were super art-oriented in their work, always borrowing concepts from their deep knowledge of post-war art. It was great. Bit after bit, I learned to understand and appreciate modern art. Also an affluent dear friend, which owned an edition by Richard Serra and other works, taught me quite a lot, on the matter.
JB
You studied architecture, and having studied architecture myself, I know how deeply it shapes one’s perception of the world. Can you explain the focus of your studies, where you studied, and how growing up in Italy, surrounded by its rich architectural history, influenced your decision to pursue architecture?
MD
I graduated from the university of Roma Tre, with a thesis about retail spaces. Those were the years of the great organic revolution, you know, Van Berkel, Asymptote, the second period of Gehry and Zaha Hadid etc. My work reflected theirs quite closely. I had to learn a lot of complex computer modeling, which was quite a novelty at the time, and almost completely ditched drawing by hand, for the better or worse. One of the retail spaces was in Via del Corso, in the very heart of the baroque Rome, and it felt great to juxtapose classic architecture with those organic, futuristic forms. Speaking of the architectural heritage, I wouldn’t say it directly affected the choice for my studies, but surely I developed an above average passion for history and tradition later on. Studying these masterpieces I could see myself within a few minutes reach was great. At the time I’d rather attend the Fine Arts Academy, but it felt too risky for the grounded environment I grew up in. Looking back, I’m grateful because I had the chance to learn a lot of things from different areas, and I enjoy a lot that architect’s ‘perception of the world’ you named.
JB
Some of your first mints deal with cities and distorted urban landscapes—many evoking images of American highways, skyscrapers, and sprawling urbanism, concepts quite foreign to Italy. Where and how did you decide to begin working in digital art? Why the theme of urbanism, and how did that evolve into landscapes and busts?
MD
Digital art was the natural way to scratch that itch that lingered for years, after I choose to study Architecture rather than a get formal education in Arts. Also, in later years I specialized in Arch Visualization and VFX, which with time became a less and less creative occupation, because the softwares evolved into something very technical and quite automatic. I had the need to express my creativity again, or rather to feel that deep joy and satisfaction that occurs whenever you complete an artwork or a design. As for the where, I never relocated abroad, but this is why your feedback is so interesting to me: those dramatic urban scenes are directly inspired by the visual products I grew up with on TV. We imported tons of american TV series and movies, and I was so fascinted by these megastructures, you know, 8-lanes highways, huge junctions and buildings and so on.
The influence by things you never actually saw in person is an important feature of pop culture. Integrating these visions in my artworks was still a personal experience: not something I’ve been at, but something I experienced in awe nonetheless. With my subjects I clearly prefer depicting human form, and that’s what I mostly did before and after the urban landscapes. In this sense, human subjects represent my very beginning, not an evolution. There’s another reason why I focused on urbanism for a while, and it’s much less poetic: these were my first AI pieces, made with Midjourny, which at the time had very limited capabilities. I preferred to explore another theme, rather than get deformed humans which don’t match my creative vision.
JB
Can you explain the mediums you initially worked with in digital art? I know from our prior exchanges that you were an early adopter of Stable Diffusion. Could you speak about your experience with this platform? Why does it resonate with you over other generative tools, and how have you made it distinctly your own?
MD
I spent some years with early digital modeling/sculpture, then digital painting. Eventually, I used Midjourney for a couple of months and switched to Stable Diffusion as soon as it was available. It was a no brainer for me, because it worked much more with a photographic mind rather than a graphics language. This matches so deeply my visual world. I imagine things as they were real, with their own matter and luminosity. My creations are tangible. I love the feeling that you could touch them, or experience their physical quality with your eye. This was not available in most of the AI tools for quite some time. A second important feature of Stable Diffusion is the ability to rework the AI output over and over, with your graphic pen. You can sketch and compose at various steps in the process, then feed it again to the AI, and continue indefinitely to get what you really want. It’s fully human mind over AI again. I developed this kind of process quite early, in November 2022, and I’m locked into it. That’s the way that really makes me happy.
JB
Stable Diffusion has gone through many iterations. Can you share why it continues to appeal to you over other platforms? And have you experimented with others?
MD
Well, the reasons why I adopted it are still valid, and I still use one early version of it. I do not enjoy the ‘grain’ and looks of any other kind of AI I tried, honestly.
JB
What motivated your shift from creating landscapes and cityscapes to focusing on portraiture? It seems to have been a natural progression from cities to sculptures to portraits and people. How do the themes and ideas from your earlier works inform your current portraits?
MD
Not precisely an evolution, more like parallel branches of exploration, one of which I couldn’t really enjoy with Midjourney. With Stable Diffusion I was able to pick up the thread of the portraiture I used to make with my graphic tablet. Portraiture is one of my preferred themes because, as simple as it is, it’s human and figurative. It gives you something to immediately relate to, both as the artist and the viewer. I definitely enjoy abstraction, and I am trying something of it lately, but figuration is an important medium these times in my opinion, both because it enables pop aesthetics and because it immediately links with less experienced audiences. Art makes its course, but I feel it went a bit too far in being detached from the average user experience. Most people don’t even know what art is about no more. I love dozens of painters on IG (Michael Carson, Martin Campos to name a couple) who are figurative but absolutley contemporary, conceptual, or abstract in their work. They apply subtle spins on something that exists since millennia, and I love it. Humanity needs high art and easy art in the same piece. The days of super concepts are over. That’s why I consider figuration a central theme in my work as well.
JB
There’s a sculptural quality to much of your work—whether it’s in your busts, compact forms like the ice block or mojito series, or even your iceberg spire. But they all share a certain softness, often shrouded in mist or haze, creating an air of seduction. The outlines in your work are rarely harsh, and this carries through even in your landscapes. What does this softness grant you as an artist?
MD
Tip of my hat to you, because I believe this is the core of my work. As I hinted at earlier, tangibility is a necessity to me. And I like to define material entities through plasticity more than outlines or boundaries. To me, form is shading and volume more than shape. So you’re absolutely on point. This also allows me to develop on the theme of blending, continuity, and non-definition. It’s an important theme in my art. Artistically speaking, I grew up believing that our contemporaneity is best interpreted through the ‘seamless’ lens. I know that this has a lot to do with architecture, seamless spaces. But it also leaked down to our very world and human nature. We’re shapeshifting, multipurpose entities. We’re liquid. I believe I’ve never clearly tackled this angle in my work, and I don’t know if I will ever be on par, but it’s definitely there from the beginning.
MD
As your work grew and matured rapidly in 2022–2023, your focus shifted more toward portraiture, particularly portraits of women. These pieces began to depart from the sculptural, fog-like quality and instead embraced vibrant color palettes that recall a 1950s aesthetic. How did this evolution come about? How do you approach color in your work, and what joy have you found in focusing on portraiture? How does your background in architecture, especially your understanding of space and form, influence the spatial dynamics of your portraits?
MD
Great question. Color is probably a matter of ‘addition’ to something I had explored already. I never abandoned the plasticity or the atmosphere, but certainly shifted the focus. I believe there’s two reasons for the addition of color to my previously immaculate work: the will to challenge myself with something else, and the important realization of the need to modulate my language for a given audience. It might seem a ‘lesser’ stance, but everything we do is within a relationship. You don’t talk with your friends like you do at a conference, you know. One should at least try to estabilish a relationship with an audience, while avoiding to misrepresent themselves.
So I purposefully embraced something new in my work, and I have to say it enriched myself very much. I was able to interpret color as a parallel feature of tangibility. These colors are luminuos, meaning they have their own light. It’s the subject declaring itself rather than a depiction. It’s contemporary, because all the energy stems from the subject like it was a photograph of a supernatural being, rather than the subjective representation of an artist.
While choosing the colors, I must feel the same awe the viewer will feel. Therefore, I mostly use colors I can’t precisely ‘name’. It’s a rule of the thumb: the less I can name it, the better. And so, as for my architectural background influencing these aspects, that would be a longer answer. I believe it works unconsciously, all the time, maybe in a kind of ‘flat’ way. My artworks are not very spatial. I think all the sensorial experience in my pieces is consumed by the materiality; the tangibility I talked about.
My spatial tastes have evolved towards fluid, undefined limbos with accents of colors or episodes—that is, interpreting the perspective in an utterly bi-dimensional way—a disorienting experience of senses which gives me pure joy. I know that you understand what I mean, and I do hope our non-architect readers will as well. That’s actually like watching an abstract picture. Imagine experiencing an abstract picture with your tridimensional body and senses. That’s one of the main gears in my latest work. Vaguely similar to some concepts used by Gerhard Richter, just to give some coordinates.
JB
What is it about the female body that fascinates you in the most general sense? It’s a dominant theme in your work. But sometimes in a very zoomed in or very particular way, such as the folds of skin; which are gorgeous.
MD
I’d say it’s just the kind of aesthetic I like the most in my life experience. I must admit that that is probably, a primary reason. But I will attempt to expand my answer a bit.
Feminine beauty was the subject of choice for entire eras, for a number or reasons: antropologic, physiologic, religious and so on. Or it’s just that they have less sharp angles. Whatever the reason, it’s mostly been a staple in art practice and cultural explorations. As a figurative artist, I feel I can’t ignore women. In ‘Skin’, one of my most intimate series, I depict them like subjects of respect and veneration. One last but very important reason, is that in my early age, circa 1985, my country was literally plastered with images of sexy, fashionable women. Fashion photography was everywhere: stores, tv, movies. Those were the years of Helmut Newton and sexual maximalism. It was mainstream. As a kid I didn’t really know what to make out of it, but that aesthetic dimension stayed with me. Growing up, I learned to appreciate the art of photographers like Sarah Moon. This fashion theme pops up every now and then in my work.
JB
Returning to your Pearl Earring with a Girl, on Foundation—many artists have reinterpreted this Vermeer classic, but your approach, inverting the girl and the pearl, is uniquely striking. What originally drew you to Vermeer’s work, and what is it about his artistry that continues to enchant you? How did the idea for the inversion come about, and what significance does Vermeer does it hold for you personally? Are there other artists from this period of time that fascinate you as well?
MD
Fantastic topic. Veermer is the champion of tangibility in my eyes. When that story about ‘camera obscuras’ resurfaced, I was nodding with a smile. Because you can literally feel the light in his work. This is why I was immediately hooked with him. I was still learning the fastly evolving technology of rendering when I stumbled into him and it was love at first sight. Not only for the aesthetics or the skill, but because it resonated with something so contemporary again: the hyper-realism. And he was way better than any later hyper-realist. He faithfully translated the unique quality of the northen europe light, in such a breathtaking way. Those windows, those surfaces. The colors hit by light.
Light as a space itself, undefined by boundaries. Overall, he’s my classical idol and main source of inspiration. That’s what I love in his art and what I actually depicted in ‘Vermeer’. I appreciate any art from that place and time. Pearl Earring with a Girl, well, that’s quite a different story. It was a piece for the ‘Deepfake’ exhibition, about the truthfullness or fakeness of the digital representation, especially in relation with the novelty of AI. I knew I wanted to reinterpret a cultural icon, something that anybody would immediately recognize, and change it enough to make it fake while retaining its recognizability.
I tried many subjects, from famous pictures to movies, to Marylin Monroe. As a Vermeer lover, I gave a shot to the ‘Pearl Earring’ as well, and it was great. So powerful is its silhouette and look, so ingrained in our culture, that it worked even in such diluted way. I must thank Clownvamp, the curator of the exhibition, for immediately telling its value. In all honesty I was so focused on dozens of studies, that I didn’t get how good it was at first. Days later, with fresh eyes, I absolutely agreed.
JB
To continue with your portraiture, in late 2024, you began exploring Japanese culture through charmingly inventive works that investigate samurais while retaining your signature foggy, ethereal style. These portraits invite viewers to fill in the gaps, with edges present but full details left to the imagination. Could you describe your process for creating the samurai series? Was this also done using Stable Diffusion? How did you work through your iterations and refinements to achieve the stunning, ‘soft-warrior’ aesthetic of these pieces?
MD
Yes, it’s Stable Diffusion 1.5—as always. I usually take many steps for any of my pieces, but the samurais took more. I rendered illustrations from Stable Diffusion, I mean ink illustrations, on paper. Then colored by hand all of them. There’s little to none AI in those colors, and I’m quite proud of that. It’s my palette; my art. AI cannot replicate it, because it’s not trained on me. In these strange times, it can be a point of pride. Then last series of steps was re-rendering everything with some actual, luminous materials in the prompt. Technically my best series so far, and one of my best, overall—in my opinion.
JB
What fascinates you about Japanese culture and the samurai as a subject? In some ways, these works seem to recall your earlier explorations of busts and statuettes, almost like sculptures atop pedestals, reminiscent of Italian artistic traditions. Perhaps I’m making connections where there are none, but could you unravel these threads for readers?
MD
I love Japanese culture for a number of reasons. In particular their material culture is just astonishing. The craft, the aesthetics, the attention to detail. The samurai armours might be one of the best example of design in history, matching amazing answers to practical needs with aesthetics in the most seamleass way. You can feel they regarded aesthetics as a function—a central debate in modern and postmodern architecture. That’s what I wanted to praise. As for the connection you make, there’s a classic interpretation in both instances indeed; straight focus on the subject, planar composition, and a sense of awe; and both try to update the model through other means: atmosphere, colors. That’s what I do for the most part. So yes, I’d say there’s definitely a connection.
Thanks, for highlighting it.
JB
When it comes to minting your work, how did you first come across Tezos, and what do you enjoy most about the community of artists and collectors there? Conversely, you also mint on Ethereum through platforms like Foundation and Manifold. Beyond differences in audience and value between Tezos and Ethereum, how do you decide which chain to mint on, and do you see yourself exploring others?
MD
Tezos was my first contact with the web3 space, following the advice of a friend. Those were times when a mint on ethereum could cost up to 50 dollars, and it was not very attracting. Tezos was. Also, I found there the first glimpses of actual art rather than the weird stuff you were used to see from the outside. Tezos enabled me and thousands of others as well. Ethereum was the next step, providing higher ceiling. At this moment, it’s quite a strange situation with a lower overall market and novelties like Rodeo; which follow degen; Zora, and so on. I can’t really tell anything about blockchain strategies because they’re so rapidly changing, other than Tezos staying a warm ‘safe house’
JB
Simultaneously, what does Solana, and platforms like Exchange, offer you in terms of collectors and on-chain ability that comes with that platform using Arweave. In short: why would someone, including you, mint in Solana? What does it offer that other chains don’t? Your minted work there is very focused, and gorgeous, by the way.
MD
I have a very limited experience with Solana. I’ve minted a collection of six 1/1s, which got much praise. Sold one. I’ve been told that it’s maybe even more ‘art oriented’ than Tezos (as opposed to being speculative) but each place has its audience, connections and rules. Bottom line, connections and affectionate followers do way more than any blockchain itself.
JB
Looking forward, based on your experiences, what guidance would you offer to artists venturing into digital portraiture and the broader digital art space?
MD
Be yourself, believe in yourself, prepare for an endless grind. It is, regardless of the success you’re experiencing. That’s part of the package, and it’s fair. I believe there are just two kinds of people who should venture here: those who unconditionally believe in their work, and those who make things with such a light heart that don’t really care about any outcome. Light heart is actually the best quality to have in web3.
JB
Finally, looking far ahead, what are your plans for future work? You’ve touched on many themes and subjects, but portraiture seems to be your main driving force—a painterly approach imbued with your unique digital, foggy, and mysterious style. Are there new themes, techniques, or platforms you aspire to explore in your upcoming projects?
MD
I’m taking it slower than before, partly for personal reasons, partly because It’s physiological, creatively speaking. Creativity needs some brewing. I’m studying, exploring, with no definite direction at this moment. As for the platforms, as I hinted at, these are rapidly changing times and personally I’m less and less interest in this side of the work. I explored quite a bit this past year with Base, Solana and a small drop on Zora, but I was frankly disappointed. Web3 is full of chances, and baits. For the time being, I like to focus on myself.
That’s the best way to live: artistry, with joy.