Daniele Buetti is a visual artist who was born in Fribourg, Switzerland. His work includes photography, video, sound, drawing, sculpture, and digitally assisted work. Buetti is known internationally, mainly for his fashion ads in the 1990s.
In his earlier work Buetti explored the meaning and influence of symbols and signs. He created a sign himself, the winged cross, which he introduced in various contexts and which he consciously allowed to be copied and misused. The artist came to prominence with his collection of works “Looking for Love” (1996-2001). The pieces show models and film stars with brand names tattooed on their skin; Buetti drew on the back of glossy magazines with a ball-pen to get the effect. With this he put the concept of the brand, its psycho-cultural causes and effects and consumption up for discussion. 'As an artist, I would never claim to have answers. I consider it my job to ask questions and to keep certain, recurring questions alive' he told the arts magazine Art in 2008.
Buetti is coping with this task in constantly changing variations. He is questioning the gap between appearance and reality, analyzes contradictions, reveals what lies underneath the glossy surface and extradites the observer, first to the truth, then to himself.
