Raffaele Salvoldi nasce come direttore della fotografia. Dopo 10 anni di attività nel settore cinematografico e pubblicitario che lo porta a collaborare in più occasioni con brand - come Gessi, Lavazza, Discovery Channel, Armani – durante gli anni del Covid, per tascorrere il difficile periodo del lockdown, inizia a realizzare nel suo soggiorno alcune strutture con 1000 mattoncini Kapla.
Nel 2022, viene ospitato dal Comitato d'Amore per Casa Bossi all'interno delle sale affrescate dell'omonima residenza antonelliana a Novara. La presenza dell'artista e delle opere diventa in brevissimo tempo un'attrazione per il pubblico, dando un contributo alla valorizzazione dell'edifico.
Nasce quindi la mission di questo progetto artistico: aggregare e emozionare le persone all'interno di luoghi culturali, attraverso una mostra che vede nel vernissage il primo metro di una struttura e nel finissage la demolizione dell'opera da parte del pubblico, evento che richiama ad ogni mostra centinaia di persone.
Nel 2023 inizia la collaborazione con il brand toscano Salvatori, che unisce due desideri: quello dell'artista di poter realizzare opere anche all'aria aperta o permanenti e quello di Gabriele Salvatori di dare nuova vita agli scarti di lavorazione delle pietre naturali. La Design Week 2023 di Milano è il momento in cui viene presentata al pubblico la prima installazione in marmo.
Durante l'estate dello stesso anno l'artista sperimenta lo sviluppo verticale, raggiungendo nella sale della Pinacoteca di Varallo un'altezza di 9,30 m utilizzando 30.000 mattoncini Kapla e i 7,40 m sul greto del fiume Mastallone, con circa 6'000 mattoncini in marmo di Carrara.

"è un viaggio inaspettato, che mi porta a scoprire di più su di me e sul mondo ad ogni tappa e sento di essere grato per tutti i luoghi che ho la possibilità di vivere e le persone che ho la fortuna di avere accanto in questo percorso.”

Raffaele Salvoldi began his career as Director of Photography in television and advertisement: for about ten years he worked freelance, collaborating with major brands such as Gessi, Lavazza, Discovery Channel, Giorgio Armani. Then the Pandemic struck, as it did everywhere. It was during the Italian lockdown of 2021 that he re-discovered an old construction toy: Kapla, in other words one thousand small, plain wooden planks. It was the perfect way to keep his hands busy and his mind focused during that difficult time and so the bulk of planks soon turned into structures of changing shapes and height to fill his living room.
A year later, 2022, he was invited by “comitato d'amore per Casa Bossi” to build some of his installations among the frescoes of the historical building of the same name situated in Novara (North West of Italy). The presence of the artist attracted a number of visitors significantly higher than the usual, allowing the building itself to be discovered and appreciated together with the artwork.
This is how the core idea of the artistic project began to form: art could make people gather into cultural places. That is why the artistic exhibition is not a mere display of finished artwork, but of the creative process itself. Each vernissage presents to the public the first metre of the stucture: this encourages visitors to come back regularly and see how the structure is rising and have a chance to speak and interact with the artist.
During the finissage, that normally attracts the largest number of people, visitors can not only admire the finished artworks, but contribute to the demolition of the main piece: at signal, they are invited to throw wooden planks against the artwork until it collapses.
2023 saw the beginning of a fruitful collaboration with the brand SALVATORI: the artist was finally able to build structures that could stand in open air or be glued and become permanent. This was in fact the fulfillment of a double wish, since SALVATORI, through Salvoldi’s work, could give new life to large quantities of marble discards. The first installation made in marble planks was presented to the public in SALVATORI's boutique during the Milan Design Week in 2023.
In the summer of the same year the artist explored verticality both with wooden and with marble planks: the former in the rooms of Pinacoteca di Varallo Sesia, with a structure of 9.3 mt and about 30.000 Kapla planks; the latter with a structure of 7.4 mt and 10.000 planks that rose from the green water of a mountain riverbed.
The end of 2023 saw the inaugural of the exhibition “Nell’Opera” (into the work), intended as an immersive experience: the size of the structure allowed the observer to cross the threshold between their body and the artwork and actually walk in, thus being able to observe the work from new angles.


“It is an unexpected journey that leads me to discover more and more about myself and the world around me. I am deeply grateful for the places I have the chance to visit and live and the people I am lucky to have by my side”.