Biography

Camilla Ancilotto was born in Rome, where she currently lives and works. In 1999 she earned her Master of Fine Arts from the New York Academy of Art. Her early work in painting and sculpture is defined by a research into interactive multiple figurations, made possible by rotating parallelepipeds.

In 2012 the monumental work Original Sin became part of the permanent sculpture collection at the Wolfson Campus (Miami Dade College). In 2013 she was selected for the 55th Venice Biennale International Art Exhibition with her work Deposition.

2017 marked the year Ancilotto embarked on the creation of deconstructible polychrome works inspired by the ancient Chinese puzzle Tangram: with this new series, titled Ab Ovo, she became the protagonist of the Festival dei Due Mondi in Spoleto with her solo exhibition Mutaforma at Palazzo Collicola Arti Visive – Museo Carandente.

In 2018 she took part in BIAS – Manifesta 12 (Palermo) and in the Van Gogh Prize – International Art Exhibition (Monreale), where her piece Katharsis received the award for the most innovative work. Invited to the 45th edition of the international Premio Sulmona, she won third prize with Nigredo.

In January 2019 her art appeared at the LA Art Show in Los Angeles, and in April at Milan Design Week with the Ab Ovo exhibition at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel. That summer she won the "Toy Museum" prize at Palazzo Rospigliosi in Zagarolo and took part in Emozioni in Mostra – Armenia meets the world at Castel dell'Ovo in Naples. In the fall she presented three Ab Ovo works in the interactive exhibition Bim Bum Bam at the Steri monumental complex in Palermo, joined the Atelier project at MACRO Asilo in Rome, and won the special prize of the "Gaetano Pallozzi" Sulmona Prize with the mirrored-steel Ab Ovo – Missile Configuration.

Between late 2019 and early 2020 the Ab Ovo series was shown at the Carlo Bilotti Museum in Villa Borghese in the exhibition Unforgettable Childhood, curated by Ermanno Tedeschi and sponsored by Roma Capitale.

Since July 2021, with the canvas Lucchetti del cuore installed at the Italian Cultural Institute in Brussels, she has served as an ambassador of Italian art in Belgium. Represented by Talk Gallery (Brussels), in November she took part in the first edition of Roma Arte in Nuvola, contributing decisively to the gallery winning the "Young Prize". In December, for Giocare a regola d'arte at the National Archaeological Museum of Naples, she presented the installation Ab Ovo: Coniglio, Gallina, Ippocampo and the interactive work Sebastiano. The same year, two mirror-polished steel Ab Ovo sculptures entered the National Museum of Ravenna (Contemporary Art Hall) and the Modern and Contemporary Art collection of Banca Patrimoni Sella; in 2022 an Ab Ovo sculpture joined the permanent collection of the Ravenna museum, a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

In June 2023 she exhibited at the Italian Cultural Institute in Tokyo as a distinguished representative of Italian art, and in July earned a place of honor among the award-winning artists of the Genoa Biennale. That same month, at the invitation of the Maison, she presented the interactive work Marilyn Breakfast at Bulgari's at the Domus Bulgari on Via dei Condotti, for the opening of the Bulgari Hotel in Rome. In October, at the 50th edition of the Sulmona Prize, her work La nuit received a prestigious award and Ancilotto was recognized among the most representative artists in the history of the Prize. In November she participated in the Singapore Art Fair and in December in Art Basel Miami.

In June 2025 Ancilotto won the First Prize for Sculpture at the 6th Genoa Biennale, with the steel Ab Ovo works exhibited in the city's historic palaces. In August, at Palazzo Valentini in Rome, an Ab Ovo – Hippocampus in mirror-polished steel and gold-leafed brass was selected for the second International Art Biennial of the Roman Riviera: previously shown in 2019 at the Belvedere Art Space Gallery in Beirut, the work stands as a "resilient" testament, having survived the explosion that struck the Lebanese capital that year. In October she took part in the tenth Rome Art Week, and in November the non-profit "We do it Together" commissioned her an all-female "Oscar": seven bronze statuettes inspired by Nike, crafted by Poignée Art and awarded in Los Angeles to figures engaged in social causes, including Sharon Stone and Bianca Balti. In June she also presented five works - two of them monumental - at the National Museum of the Risorgimento in Turin.

On several occasions the Ab Ovo works have been selected as honorary prizes in charity auctions of the Italian Red Cross: in 2022, at the Charity Dinner at Villa Miani with the Rome Film Festival, her bronze sculpture was awarded to Massimo Caputi; in November 2025 a satin-finished brass Hippocampus was won by ballerina Eleonora Abbagnato, former étoile of the Paris Opera. Her works are featured in prestigious private collections, including those of Tommaso Ziffer, Andrea della Valle, Emiliano and Ottavia Cerasi, Hollywood producer Kenny Alhadeff, and Anna Bulgari.