aranea

From ridavio. Angelo Musco is a New York-based artist who works with the human body to create his art. His work is impressive, and being able to participate in the creative process with him is always fun. While I was in Turkey when his large shoot happened, I was able to interview him later after he completed the piece and edited this 'making of' with footage shot by a volunteer.


To create Aranea Angelo needed an enormous quantity of naked bodies. In September he held a photo shoot in Asbury Park, NJ. Around 80 models were recruited to participate. The convention hall on the boardwalk was closed to the public at midnight and for over five hours Angelo and his assistant Danielle worked with the models to create the numerous shapes needed to form the piece.

As Angelo explains in the video, the word Aranea defines a genus of orb-weaving spider thus the creation of the piece consisted in weaving a web with human bodies. The photos taken this evening were mostly used to create the negative space of the web. Several additional photo sessions were held in his New York studio to create the positive elements.

To finish the project Angelo and Danielle worked for several months, and in the last 2 months for 12 - 20 hours a day, to create a web with over 52,000 bodies. The final piece is an 8' X 16' photograph in four panels. Aranea exhibits at Pulse Art Fair in New York City, from March 4 - 7, 2010. Angelo is represented by the Carrie Secrist gallery.