Riccardo T. on performance, Pilates, and passion

Mark T Cox

A sleepy, snowy February afternoon is brightened by the sound of Riccardo’s voice. Phone on loudspeaker, coffee in hand, I’ve been looking forward to this chat all week.

For over an hour, we talk about life, dance, art and passion. We talk about chasing dreams, adapting to realities, and focusing on what makes us feel satisfied and fulfilled. 

Riccardo T. is a performance artist, life model, dancer, and soon to be the next superstar Pilates instructor of the world!

After growing up in Italy and studying dance at the prestigious La Scala in Milan, Riccardo moved to London to continue their studies and begin an exciting career in the arts.

Today, Riccardo is making plans for the next chapter, a portfolio career for a post-Covid future. 

Lens of Passion: Riccardo, you do so many things, and somehow manage to do them all beautifully! Which would you say is your main passion?

Riccardo T.: 10 years ago I would have said dance. My whole life has been consumed by dance since I was 10 or 11 years old. So that’s what I expected to end up doing as my career. 

But in my twenties, I moved into performance art and found myself realising that was what I wanted to do in life. Of course in 2021, it is so difficult to be solely an artist, to be sustainable. Apart from the very very small percentage of artists who become extremely well known and successful, most artists have to adapt and be inventive to survive!

Maybe this is the secret to being a successful and sustainable artist? The ability to adapt, to be inventive, and to juggle multiple things?

Definitely. And these additional things, the other work, become part of a person’s professional practice, and feed into their work. Teaching, part-time work, side jobs, all add something to a person’s experience and ultimately flows into their work and their art. 

Of course there are artists who are fortunate and privileged not to have to juggle multiple things, but those situations are rare.

I wonder if having a rich and privileged background can in fact limit an artist’s potential? Do you think the struggle and the hussle of balancing life and art might actually add a certain depth to a person’s art?

Completely. It has a massive impact. It would be fantastic to have endless time and funds available to develop art, but I think not having something to push you along might actually become a greater challenge. As artists, we often need to overcome things in order to make interesting work. Maybe we need a certain amount of struggle to push us along.

What about this word ‘passion’. Is this a word you would often use to describe your work?

All the time. I’m a very romantic person. I love to fantasise about the meaning of things, the meaning of doing things. And I truly believe that I need to do interesting work in order to keep going, in order to have a meaning in life. I need these passions. 

I don’t have a heteronormative life of finding meaning in getting married, buying a house, having children, and so for me I find huge meaning in my art and my work. That is my passion. 

Can you remember the first time you felt all consumed by something? When you first felt passion?

For me, my first hobby was actually gymnastics. I was very good at it, but it definitely wasn’t a passion. I enjoyed gymnastics, but I always found myself watching the rhythmic gymnasts who trained in the same club as me. I loved observing them and I became really interested in their fluidity and movement. It was all so much more artistic than the standard gymnastics I was doing. 

Then I started dance class, and I was good at it. Really good. And people started telling me I was good. I’m always really interested in how we accept love and attention, and how being the best that we can be at something can lead to us receiving more love. 

You liked the praise and the attention? 

I loved it, of course! 

And when did you realise you were better than others at dance? When did you realise you might be special? 

The funny thing with dance is that a lot of the talent comes from the body, which is something you are born with. For me, very early on, teachers and other dancers would tell me how amazing I was and how perfect my body was for dance. It was something I hadn’t really earned, I was just born with it, so that can be a funny thing to process. 

Next I was encouraged to audition for La Scala, a very prestigious dance school in Milan, and I got in. Suddenly at the age of 13, everything jumped to the next level. It was a massive recognition of what I was doing, but also huge pressure. 

While at La Scala, I really excelled, alongside some of the best dancers in the world. I never reached the major peaks of global fame, but that’s common. So few people reach the very very top. 

Did your love for dance change at all while at La Scala? There’s always a risk when your passion becomes your full-time focus that some of the fun can disappear. 

No, I think it never changed while I was there. But now, looking back at that time, my relationship with dance has definitely changed. After I finished at La Scala, I moved to the UK to complete my BA in Contemporary Dance, and then began working. 

Looking back now at my life as a teenager, dancing for eight hours a day, it seems incredible to me that I did that. That would be so difficult to do now as an adult. And expensive too. I think now my passion for dance is probably less strong, but more sustainable in the long term.

Let’s talk about balancing passion and profit. When did you realise that a life in the arts was going to be difficult? When did you figure out how to work with that difficulty and develop this interesting portfolio career you have now?

I’ve been very lucky to come from a relatively privileged background, and I think that is always important to acknowledge. My parents were able to support me through my studies and that definitely gave me a lot of help at the beginning of my career. When I finished my studies, my parents agreed to help with paying rent for a few more months but then I was cut off. Then I had to be an adult and figure out how to keep myself going, alone. 

Like most artists, I found myself working in a shop five days a week, and suddenly it was very hard to find any time or energy to create things or focus on my art. I did that for a few years and it was extremely difficult to find time to do anything.

Eventually, I took a risk and started working part-time, which allowed some time for other pop-up work, life modelling jobs, and time to focus on developing my practice with my partner Antonio. This extra time and flexibility really helped me to grow and to prosper as an artist. This was the beginning of my portfolio career, and the beginning of a life balancing multiple things to earn money but also to progress my art. 

And let’s talk about today, or maybe more so tomorrow. We’ve all had our careers devastated by the pandemic. How do you imagine your work will be different in the new post-Covid world?

I’ve had a chance to do a lot of thinking about what happens next and what I want my life to be. I’m hitting the big 30th birthday this year, which has made me really reassess things. 

For a long time I think I’ve snubbed my background in dance and was determined to present myself as an artist, rather than a dancer. But over the past year I’ve really started to think about how to combine my backgrounds and do something interesting, maybe something new! 

And so, completely by chance, I discovered Pilates!

A friend of mine offered me some free classes last year, just something to do during lockdown, and I loved it. There are a lot of similarities between Pilates and dance really. It’s all about the body, and being aware of the sensitivities and sensibilities of the body, something which I’ve always enjoyed. I quickly started to think “maybe this is something I’d like to do”. And so I started to do my research, found out what it takes to train to become an instructor and just decided to go for it! 

I’m really looking forward to working with bodies again, and excited to see how it will influence my performance art. There is massive fulfillment and satisfaction from Pilates, working with people, often helping them to heal from body pain. It’s very rewarding. 

It’s also great to earn your money doing something which will directly inspire you and feed into your art practice. So often, artists are forced to take side jobs which are completely unrelated to their passion just to pay the bills. 

Exactly, I’m excited to have found something which will sustain me financially but also influence my art.

It’s a brave thing to do. I wonder if being an artist and being used to juggling multiple things has made this decision easier for you?

I think so. I think if I had a full time job and a ‘normal’ career, it would feel like a massive risk to jump into this new thing which I’ve only just discovered. But as artists, we are used to meeting challenges and taking risks, and so I’m just excited to start my training and seeing what adventures come next!

So it’s 2025. Let’s imagine you’ve completed your training, you’re a successful Pilates instructor, plus balancing your mix of other work as a life model and performance artist. Do you think there’s anything else rumbling inside you that you haven’t been able to explore yet? 

I think in the future, my work will allow me to travel a lot more. Once I’ve trained in Pilates, the really nice thing is that I can take it anywhere and teach anywhere. That’s super exciting for me. I’m looking forward to the freedom to explore and discover new places through my work, which will ultimately come back to inspire and influence my art practice. 

I’m so jealous. I can picture you flying off to an island somewhere for three months, teaching Pilates on a beach. 

Exactly. I can’t wait !

I can’t wait to see what experiences and interactions it leads to. As artists, we constantly need new inspiration to help us to continue and develop our work.

How can Lens of Passion’s readers learn more about your work and support your projects?

You can take a look at my practice website below, which I run with my partner Antonio Branco. We are currently working on a new commission for BUZZCUT Festival in July 2021 which will be very exciting. We also have some video work showing in a festival at The Place in March, which we are very proud of. https://www.antonioandriccardo.com/

Riccardo, thank you so much for talking to us. Your story is such an interesting example of the complications, twists and turns that we can face when pursuing our passions. But with lots of positivity and the confidence to take some risks, it can lead to an exciting and fulfilling life. 

My pleasure! 

xx