Exhibitions, Italy, Vicenza, 11 November 2010
The artist Monica Marioni creates with an elaborated technique an ingenious world of eternal desire, silent dreams, and pure femininity. By combining classic sagas with contemporary art concepts she realizes complex images of goddesses from beyond.
The Exhibition
The Italian artist Monica Marioni presents the complete cycle of her new works especially created for this exhibition. In this work cycle with huge and very detailed color print photomontages Monica Marioni combines and re-interprets with a courageous and contemporary approach the antique saga characters of the nymphs and the four classic elements such as air, fire, earth, and water.
On all photomontages of the exhibition you discover a young woman. She is an allegory for the element and its qualities. She wears a beautiful dress, is surrounded by strange scenery entirely full of secret symbols, and seems to be a goddess living in another world. The character of the nymph is introverted, spiritual and mystic, the surroundings content references to all times and cultures. Eastern and Western world, but also past and future seem to be merged in each picture. But most of all, the works speak about femininity, inner and outer beauty, desire, purity and eternity as well as emotions and sensations.
Both, the myth of the nymphs and the four elements, were already created in prehistoric and antique times. The nymphs were beneficent demi-goddesses with a kind of eternal youth who accompanied higher gods and helped the humans. They represented the natural forces like wind and water or places, plants or animals. Because their significance always was close to fertility and sexuality, they always have been a popular theme in the arts, especially in the Middle Ages, renaissance and romanticism.
In an extensive process the artist chose four models, styled them carefully, posed them exactly, and took high resolution images. Sometimes Monica Marioni even had to put together several pictures of a person to receive the needed resolution. All dresses, make ups and coiffures were invented and made by the artist Monica Marioni herself. She used very special and exclusive haute couture fashion fabrics and spent many hours per “nymph” to prepare the face and hair carefully. After having taken the pictures, she spent days and nights in front of the computer to ad all details and create the balanced and well composed images.
It is part of the concept that the colors of the photomontages have been reduced and the background is hold either mainly black or white. Monica Marioni always made a few collateral works per element around a “mother piece” where the nymph dominates the element. In the collateral pieces it is the element what controls the nymph.
In occasion of the exhibition a catalogue will be edited.
The Performance
During the first hour of the opening a unique life art performance with four models is waiting for the visitors. In the middle of the exhibition hall, a former church and covered by a light cone, there is a circle of sand on the floor. And in the center of the sand, there is a huge block of stone, a fragment of a historic building. In this scenery, four young women, four “nymphs”, are silently and slowly dancing and moving around. Accompanied by traditional folk music from Turkey, as another earlier part of the antique world, the nymph “Terra/Earth” is located on the stone. The other three nymphs are circling on the sand around the stone
As the attentive observer can see, the nymphs, “Aria/Air”, “Fuoco/Fire” and “Aqua/Water”, are forming a pyramid with four edges, what is a symbolic reference as well.
Besides of the laborious process of preparing the models, there is an accurate choreography, also created by the artist, in the dance and the performance. Precisely one hour after the opening of the exhibition, the young women disappear and the performance stops. Only the sand with the footprints and the stone as symbols of eternity and fugacity will stay and remain.
The Artist Monica Marioni
Marioni was born near Treviso in 1972, she graduated in Statistics, and started a management career that she soon left to devote herself entirely to that art that she has nurtured since she was very young in every spare moment, working mostly at night. The turning point in her artistic life was in 2004, when she was spotted by the international known curator Antonina Zaru, owner of the Capricorno Gallery, based in Capri and Washington DC, and already linked to the success of artists like Frangi, Pignatelli, Nam June Paik. Since then, her artistic commitment has become total, and it has been addressed by Marioni daily for several hours a day with the fervor of those who create primarily for personal inner needs.
Nowadays she exhibits continuously in Italy and abroad: her personal exhibits at the Carlo Livi Gallery in Miami, at the Poltrona Frau showroom in Washington D.C. and at the Museum of Italian Art in Lima (Peru) are just some recent examples, as well as the achievement of the 1st prize "Fiorino d'Oro" in Florence, her attendance to the Détournement Venise 2009, a sideshow to the 53rd Biennale d'Arte in Venice, with the video installation EGO and the permanent painting exhibit ALTER EGO, which can still be visited in the elegant environments of the Stucky Hilton Venice Hotel.
The international interest on her research is further confirmed by the invitation to create a work for the MMX 2010 International Fine Art Collection, the official licensee for the official artistic products 2010 FIFA World Cup South AfricaTM. The initiative has involved five young artists per country taking part to the World Cup whereby all of them were invited to create a work on this theme. Among the selected Italians, there was also Mr. Andrea Chiesi.
The Curator Oliver Orest Tschirky
The Swiss curator and art critic Oliver Orest Tschirky initiates and realizes contemporary art exhibitions and projects all over the world. He holds a Master degree in International Relations from the University of St. Gallen, Switzerland, a Swiss advocate license, as well as a Master of Art History and Spanish Literature from the University of Berne, Switzerland. He has held positions as Assistant Curator of the Museum of Fine Art Berne, Curator of the Kunsthaus Langenthal, Vice Director of Art Basel, Gallery Director of Artvera’s, Geneva, and Director of the Art Academy of St. Gallen.
As art historian, Oliver Orest Tschirky has extensive experience with museums and experimental exhibition spaces as well as writing and editing exhibition catalogues and other publications and organizing cultural projects and events. He specializes in modern and contemporary art, prefers sustainable and interdisciplinary approaches and communicates in English, German, French, Spanish and Italian.
The Exhibition
The Italian artist Monica Marioni presents the complete cycle of her new works especially created for this exhibition. In this work cycle with huge and very detailed color print photomontages Monica Marioni combines and re-interprets with a courageous and contemporary approach the antique saga characters of the nymphs and the four classic elements such as air, fire, earth, and water.
On all photomontages of the exhibition you discover a young woman. She is an allegory for the element and its qualities. She wears a beautiful dress, is surrounded by strange scenery entirely full of secret symbols, and seems to be a goddess living in another world. The character of the nymph is introverted, spiritual and mystic, the surroundings content references to all times and cultures. Eastern and Western world, but also past and future seem to be merged in each picture. But most of all, the works speak about femininity, inner and outer beauty, desire, purity and eternity as well as emotions and sensations.
Both, the myth of the nymphs and the four elements, were already created in prehistoric and antique times. The nymphs were beneficent demi-goddesses with a kind of eternal youth who accompanied higher gods and helped the humans. They represented the natural forces like wind and water or places, plants or animals. Because their significance always was close to fertility and sexuality, they always have been a popular theme in the arts, especially in the Middle Ages, renaissance and romanticism.
In an extensive process the artist chose four models, styled them carefully, posed them exactly, and took high resolution images. Sometimes Monica Marioni even had to put together several pictures of a person to receive the needed resolution. All dresses, make ups and coiffures were invented and made by the artist Monica Marioni herself. She used very special and exclusive haute couture fashion fabrics and spent many hours per “nymph” to prepare the face and hair carefully. After having taken the pictures, she spent days and nights in front of the computer to ad all details and create the balanced and well composed images.
It is part of the concept that the colors of the photomontages have been reduced and the background is hold either mainly black or white. Monica Marioni always made a few collateral works per element around a “mother piece” where the nymph dominates the element. In the collateral pieces it is the element what controls the nymph.
In occasion of the exhibition a catalogue will be edited.
The Performance
During the first hour of the opening a unique life art performance with four models is waiting for the visitors. In the middle of the exhibition hall, a former church and covered by a light cone, there is a circle of sand on the floor. And in the center of the sand, there is a huge block of stone, a fragment of a historic building. In this scenery, four young women, four “nymphs”, are silently and slowly dancing and moving around. Accompanied by traditional folk music from Turkey, as another earlier part of the antique world, the nymph “Terra/Earth” is located on the stone. The other three nymphs are circling on the sand around the stone
As the attentive observer can see, the nymphs, “Aria/Air”, “Fuoco/Fire” and “Aqua/Water”, are forming a pyramid with four edges, what is a symbolic reference as well.
Besides of the laborious process of preparing the models, there is an accurate choreography, also created by the artist, in the dance and the performance. Precisely one hour after the opening of the exhibition, the young women disappear and the performance stops. Only the sand with the footprints and the stone as symbols of eternity and fugacity will stay and remain.
The Artist Monica Marioni
Marioni was born near Treviso in 1972, she graduated in Statistics, and started a management career that she soon left to devote herself entirely to that art that she has nurtured since she was very young in every spare moment, working mostly at night. The turning point in her artistic life was in 2004, when she was spotted by the international known curator Antonina Zaru, owner of the Capricorno Gallery, based in Capri and Washington DC, and already linked to the success of artists like Frangi, Pignatelli, Nam June Paik. Since then, her artistic commitment has become total, and it has been addressed by Marioni daily for several hours a day with the fervor of those who create primarily for personal inner needs.
Nowadays she exhibits continuously in Italy and abroad: her personal exhibits at the Carlo Livi Gallery in Miami, at the Poltrona Frau showroom in Washington D.C. and at the Museum of Italian Art in Lima (Peru) are just some recent examples, as well as the achievement of the 1st prize "Fiorino d'Oro" in Florence, her attendance to the Détournement Venise 2009, a sideshow to the 53rd Biennale d'Arte in Venice, with the video installation EGO and the permanent painting exhibit ALTER EGO, which can still be visited in the elegant environments of the Stucky Hilton Venice Hotel.
The international interest on her research is further confirmed by the invitation to create a work for the MMX 2010 International Fine Art Collection, the official licensee for the official artistic products 2010 FIFA World Cup South AfricaTM. The initiative has involved five young artists per country taking part to the World Cup whereby all of them were invited to create a work on this theme. Among the selected Italians, there was also Mr. Andrea Chiesi.
The Curator Oliver Orest Tschirky
The Swiss curator and art critic Oliver Orest Tschirky initiates and realizes contemporary art exhibitions and projects all over the world. He holds a Master degree in International Relations from the University of St. Gallen, Switzerland, a Swiss advocate license, as well as a Master of Art History and Spanish Literature from the University of Berne, Switzerland. He has held positions as Assistant Curator of the Museum of Fine Art Berne, Curator of the Kunsthaus Langenthal, Vice Director of Art Basel, Gallery Director of Artvera’s, Geneva, and Director of the Art Academy of St. Gallen.
As art historian, Oliver Orest Tschirky has extensive experience with museums and experimental exhibition spaces as well as writing and editing exhibition catalogues and other publications and organizing cultural projects and events. He specializes in modern and contemporary art, prefers sustainable and interdisciplinary approaches and communicates in English, German, French, Spanish and Italian.
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