Luca Ximenes a.k.a. DesX
Luca Ximenes, known as DesX, is an Italian visual artist born in L’Aquila in 1976. He lives and works in Rome.
His alias, DesX (from Data Encryption Standard 10), originates from computer cryptography and reflects both his early need for anonymity—when his first urban works were created illegally—and his fascination with cyberpunk culture. This influence is evident in his fragmented, incomplete visual language, open to multiple interpretations.
Active in the underground scene since the early 1990s, he began exhibiting his works in public space more consistently from 2011. With a background in architecture, he merges technical structure with a strong visual and conceptual sensibility, working across oil painting, contemporary muralism and Street Art. His pieces are characterized by a strong relationship with spatial context and thematic composition.
Ximenes has taken part in major Street Art festivals in Italy and abroad, including Upfest in Bristol and the Sand, Sea and Spray Festival in Blackpool. He has collaborated with public entities and NGOs such as Amnesty International, ActionAid and ANPI on projects addressing social and cultural issues.
He is the founder and curator of “ReActo Fest”, an art initiative focused on Street Art, held in L’Aquila in 2014, 2015, 2016 and 2021. Conceived after the 2009 earthquake, the festival aimed to contribute to the area’s social and material reconstruction through artistic intervention.
His paintings have been shown in both solo and group exhibitions, and he has participated in several editions of Roma Art Week, contributing to Rome’s contemporary art landscape through exhibitions, open studios and collaborations with curators and artists.
His work has received coverage from major media outlets such as BBC, Rai, Repubblica, Radio Rock, Street Art Utopia, Global Street Art and Street Art Magazine. His visual output—both murals and studio paintings—has also appeared in commercial contexts (Sony PlayStation, Pilot) and in the film industry (Rodeo Drive, Lucky Red, Netflix and Prime Video).
Selected recent exhibitions and collaborations include:
Urban Prospective Gallery (Rome), Galleria Chroma (Rome), LVL Art Gallery (Rome), Centro Hispanoamericano de Cultura (Havana), Macro La Pelanda (Rome), Tevere Art Gallery (Rome) and Zona Aromatica Protetta (Florence).
Public murals and festival appearances include:
Upfest (Bristol), Sand, Sea and Spray (Blackpool), Pulpa Festival (Montesilvano), Re_Visioni Festival (Rome), Localart Walls (Certaldo), Calafrika Festival (Calabria), Global Street Art (London), projects in Berlin and Barcelona, as well as numerous artistic interventions in Rome, L’Aquila, Milan and Florence.
Events at Rome Art Week
2024
2023
2022
2020
2019
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