Lorenzo Mattotti studied Architecture at the University of Venice and started his career in the ‘70s as a comics writer. Frequenting often the stimulating scene of comics writers in Bologna, together with other artists, he founded the magazine Valvoline (1983), and, the year after, he also published his book Fires, work that will make his highly expressive and evocative style achieve international acclaim.
Moving permanently to Paris in 1988, Lorenzo became part of the international illustration scene, exploring forms of artistic expression other than comics, a genre, however, that he will still continue to cultivate. Among the many publications, we find La Zona Fatua, (released in 1998 by Albin Michel as part of a volume entitled Murmure), L’Uomo alla Finestra (Feltrinelli, 1992), Le Voyage de Caboto (Albin Michel, 1993), and Stigmates, first published in France in 1994 by Autrement in the anthology Le Retour de Dieu and further developed in Le Bruit du Givre (Seuil, 2003).
Alongside his collaboration with newspapers like "The New Yorker","Cosmopolitan", "Le Monde", "Suddeutsche Zeitung", "Il Corriere della Sera" and "La Repubblica", Lorenzo also accepted commissions from the visual communication sector, developing a particular interest in the language of film. In 2004, following on from his animation for children, Eugenio e Pinocchio, he created the illustrations for Eros, a film series directed by Michelangelo Antonioni, Steven Soderbergh and Wong Kar-wai, and, in 2008, he also collaborated on the collective animation Peur(s) du noir (2008). It is again an animation project his more recent major focus: the feature film La famosa invasione degli orsi in Sicilia, produced by Prima Linea Productions and co-produced by Pathé, France 3 Cinéma and Indigo Film, won the Fondation Gan pour le Cinéma Special Prize at the 2019 Cannes Film Festival.