Maria Positano (London, 1995) is a Neapolitan artist currently living and working in Naples. Having grown up in different countries (England, the USA, France, and Italy) and trained in London (Royal College of Art, 2023), her practice stems from a sense of plural identity, shaped by a frequently itinerant lifestyle.

Positano’s work revolves around the body as a relational and vulnerable space, where armour becomes a metaphor for a transforming skin - between protection, identity, and contact with others. Through hybrid forms, fragile materials, and practices of reuse, the artist weaves together memory, gender, and culture to create open and poetic narratives. This portfolio presents selected sculptural works (2023–2025) exploring armour as a metaphor for vulnerable and relational forms of embodiment.

“In Maria Positano’s practice, the relationships between interdependent elements revolve around a reflection on the concept of the body both as an individual organism, exchanging energy with its environment, and as a collective organism, defined by its ability to engage with space. It is at this point of contact that the analogy with armour emerges. Recurrent in the artist’s work, armour is understood not only as passive protection but as a system that safeguards while also mediating with its surroundings, communicating and adapting. The solidity of the shell at times reveals greater vulnerability, taking on the appearance of a second, permeable skin. Depending on the work, the materials (velvet, fabrics, and papier-mâché textures) become capable of filtering, perceiving, and amplifying sensations—not as a barrier, but as a living, adaptive interface connecting the body to the surrounding world. The rib cage, coccyx, and spine—at times recognisable—give way to the body’s sensitive dimension: an emotional form that weaves together memory, identity, and gender in contact with the other.”

Text by Edoardo De Cobelli