Fabio Fontana: Beauty and Urgency from the Sea

Fabio Fontana (b. 1974) is an Italian artist whose practice brings together painting, hand-crafted printmaking, surf culture, and a deep reverence for the natural world. Living and working in Anzio, a small coastal town south of Rome overlooking the Mediterranean Sea, Fabio’s art is both a personal meditation and a quiet yet urgent reflection on humanity’s fragile connection with nature.

Water is a substance at the origin of creation—we ourselves are mostly water, just like our planet. That, to me, is incredibly beautiful.

— Fabio Fontana


Educated at the Academy of Fine Arts in Rome, Fabio’s work is grounded in traditional printing methods, such as linocut, xylography (woodblock printing), and cyanotype. His process is intentional and tactile—carving, stamping, layering ink by hand, or even by foot, using woodblocks as surfboards. These physical gestures mirror the rhythm and sensitivity of the ocean itself.

Under the name GOS Lab (Green Ocean Surfing Laboratory), Fabio frames his work as both homage and offering—to the sea, and to the consciousness he hopes it can awaken. His compositions often draw from ancestral symbols, minimalist forms, and meditative mark-making rooted in Aboriginal dot painting. Yet in his hands, they become microcosms of waves, droplets, and living movement.

From cyanotype blueprints that feel like borrowed fragments of the sea, to surf-inspired prints on driftwood and fabric, Fabio’s work is consistently shaped by his connection to place—and a belief that art can quietly shift perception.