Cibarius, thank you so much for taking the time to chat with us. For starters, where are you from?
I am from Italy, specifically from a small town in Tuscany, where I currently reside with my family. I started at an early age to cultivate my creativity by approaching music, first as a drummer and then as a music producer(or bedroom producer….. I hate this term :))It was precisely my activity as a musician that was a strong influence for my becoming a visual artist since every time I prepared a demo ep I would create the covers with the intention of creating a continuum between music and visual art.
Can you tell us about your background and what lead you down the path to becoming an artist and ultimately experimenting with NFTs?
As I mentioned earlier, my artistic path mainly comes from 20 years of producing electronic music, particularly House and Techno. Whenever I put and stand in front of my instruments I visualize objects, shapes, characters, or scenes and so the most natural result was just to imprint these visions into a handful of pixels. Then in 2021 I found out that a friend had become a well-known artist in the NFT world so I decided, given my familiarity with the blockchain world, to try to create my alter ego in the art field and mine my first piece of photographic manipulation. The funny thing is that “cibarius” the name I chose for my NFT journey, is a mushroom. I chose this name because it honors one of my greatest passions outside of art: mycology
When did you mint your first NFT? What platform did you choose and why?
I minted my first work in November 2021, it was a photo manipulation of a Tuscan landscape that I called “Pinkish.” The piece was an expression of the concept of a bleak and sad countryside that took a pink color palette to emphasize that beauty can sometimes also be a bleak element. Fortunately, I was able to mint it on FND after a very kind Thai photographer invited me inside the platform.
Can you tell us one thing you cannot live without? (and why)
I could not live without my family who support me every day and motivate me in whatever I do. I could not live without the music that has been and will be, trivially, the soundtrack of my life. I could not live without expressing myself in relation to the world and all that set of nuances that are created between what surrounds me and the way in which I interpret it.
Who is your favorite artist(s) (Non-NFT)? What about their style resonates with you?
Honestly, I don’t have an inspirational muse, but clearly, in my artistic background, there are many periods and artists who unintentionally inspired me. From Basquiat to Falero, from Schiele to Schifano, for example. Not to mention the music world, in which I have thousands of artists that I adore and influence me from so many different genres. I firmly believe that in the art world, there is no one way to be influenced, I believe there is a very powerful mix of attitudes afferent to styles, behaviors, and languages, which translate into the artist’s code.
Who is your favorite NFT artist? What makes this artist unique? What made you pursue NFT art?
As soon as I entered Twitter, I remember having mainly approached Italian artists. I remember that I was struck by Vittorio Bonapace for having been able to combine ancient and very modern, futuristic themes in a single concept. He is what I consider a digital artist or at least my acceptance of the digital artist par excellence: someone who manages to keep the artistic legacy alive by giving it a totally new profile and therefore not superimposable on the past. And this motivated me to assign my journey into the world of NFTs: the awareness that there was room for experimentation.
What is the one piece of NFT art you wish you had purchased but missed out on?
I’m not a big collector, so the majority of the pieces I would like to own are out of my reach.
But I have to mention an artist I would say LordNeutron
If you could travel anywhere in the world where would you go? Why this location?
I probably wouldn’t settle in any country except the one where I live. But I won’t deny that the Asian world particularly attracts me for its centuries-old history, and surely their more spiritual approach to life would be able to convince me that there isn’t just one place worth living.
What are your other passions besides art? Why?
My biggest passion besides art is mycology and in honor of that, I’ve cibarius as my alias. It’s the name of a yellow mushroom that i find special because when the wood is totally brown and dark green, in autumn, it is so visible, it pops out very clearly.
It’s a disruptive thing.
Do you make other forms of art?
I’m a music producer, a synth nerd!
How did you come up with your specific style?
My style is the result of a journey. I started to express my creativity using vector art, to then feel the need to explore a more real environment, so I started taking my first steps in the photo manipulation environment where I created surreal environments. But then I realized that the thing that interested me most was to give voice to all my skills, so I decided to blend vector art. photo manipulation, and photography inside a much bigger container: 3d. In this way I was able to fully satisfy the need to join an ancient dialectic with a modern concept.
How has your style evolved over the years?
Of course. I think that this is my strength and my weakness.
I can’t stick with a strict aesthetical style, but on the conceptual side, I’m always trying to explore the same themes.
What is coming in the near future?
I’m working on my first animated piece where i finally have created a soundtrack……stay tuned!
If you could collaborate with one artist who would it be?
I would like to collaborate with Uyo66 because I’m very very curious about the blend of two completely different staples….and then: how cool is his art????
Do you have any upcoming drops?
The animated piece I’m working on will be minted but at the moment I’m not sure about the release date, because I’m thinking about creating a mini-series.
But like every time what dictates a drop is my heart and not my mind, so who knows?
What was your greatest failure and what did you learn from that?
The greatest ones it’s been to give up with my career of musician in 2010.Never give up is not just a sentence pronunciate for the “culture” it’s a state of mind.
But anyway it creates in me the will the change myself to become something different, someone who use a different “vocabulary”.
Where can collectors find your work?
cibarius.art
https://twitter.com/cibarius_
https://www.instagram.com/cibarius.art/
http://superrare.com/cibarius
https://foundation.app/@cibarius
https://knownorigin.io/cibarius
Biggest piece sold?
0.25 ETH