Although modern times saw us develop an idea that our art is something unbound by any set of tangible rules, the truth is that we still condition the way we observe art to some extent.

This is just a side-effect of the way we are mentally constructed – we need to have certain parameters in place in order to sufficiently understand and categorize things around us.

One of these artistic axioms we’ll be taking a closer look at today is the premise that appreciating paintings, with all their subtleties and details, requires a good source of illumination. After all, observing a painting is a visual experience and surely looking at it means that we need something to cast light on it, right? Well, if we were to ask Crisco that question, we’re not sure he’d entirely agree.

Cristoforo Scorpiniti is the real name of Crisco, an Italian artist who looks to push the boundaries of how we perceive paintings. He challenges the idea that you can only appreciate a painting in full light with his artworks that, although lovely to look at in daylight, really come to life when the lights go out!

Crisco achieves this by using glow-in-the-dark paint to embellish his works, a practice that basically allows him to create two paintings within the same composition that, depending on whether the piece is in the dark or not, conceals one of the narratives. The works transition from day to night scenes as the surroundings get darker, allowing you to see things the gleam hides.