| There lives within me an insatiable appetite to squeeze from every fragment, a universe. That’s probably the exaggeration factor in all Italians, or all of Latin for that sake. We enjoy amplifying mundane issues and converting them into seemingly life-changing happenings, and what’s worse, we believe them to be universally significant. I take possession of stories that may or may not be my own and cast myself as the protagonist. These fictitious characters live within my paintings and I let them breathe the moment, the minute details, to the point in which I lose touch with what is reality and what is fiction, what’s mine and what I’ve borrowed. | 
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Luca Bray is an Italian artist living in New York City.
Luca Bray, Una Casa Para Mi Papa, 2008. Oil on canvas, 118.5 x 79 inches. Courtesy of the artist.There lives within me an insatiable appetite to squeeze from every fragment, a universe. That’s probably the exaggeration factor in all Italians, or all of Latin for that sake. We enjoy amplifying mundane issues and converting them into seemingly life-changing happenings, and what’s worse, we believe them to be universally significant. I take possession of stories that may or may not be my own and cast myself as the protagonist. These fictitious characters live within my paintings and I let them breathe the moment, the minute details, to the point in which I lose touch with what is reality and what is fiction, what’s mine and what I’ve borrowed. Each painting is like sitting in at someone else’s private therapy session. I interpret an existence and adopt it as my own. For a lack of a better term: I steal you.
I believe I have also mastered the art of speaking three languages as terribly as possible, and actually take pride in my ability of destroying them even further by using them to complete my paintings. I try not to lose time by taking either life or myself too seriously. I believe I’m more selfish, more childlike in a sense, maybe more naïve. I want to play for the sake of playing. Too many rules limit my process. My creation is visceral, immediate, and transparent. It comes from the inside out. My work is not selfish, though my dialogue is. I talk to myself, for myself. I need the listener but not the topic. I prefer to indulge my need for the banal while leaving the pseudo-world-fixing to others. I exercise my right to continue playing with my inner child in place of permanent over-analysis.
