» Artists » Margherita Leoni

Margherita Leoni

MARGHERITA LEONI

“The immortality of flowers must enrich our own and we should certainly resent a Redemption that excluded them” Emily Dickinson

The beauty of flowers and plants, their variety and their symbolic language were always a source of fascination for poets and artists, exercising a poetic attraction since the beginning of time, with countless examples filling centuries of art, music and literature, often bringing together religiousness, aesthetic admiration and scientific observation.

Margherita Leoni for over ten year has been portraying the plant life of the wild forests in Brazil. In depth immersion in the natural element, has allowed her to seize the impressive richness of vegetation, with a progressive increase in the information relative to the environment. Here we are not in front of the exotic interpretation of a different nature, but the feat of enriching one’s knowledge through the extraordinary catalogue with which she came into contact. The wild forests, where Margherita Leoni patiently produces her vision of the world, are natural systems which enjoy a precious balance, according to which the species that are developed there correspond to the optimal level of life for the conditions of the environment. Penetrating them, getting to know them and representing their luxuriant beauty invites a cultural appropriation of an existential perspective which identifies sustainability as the compass to guide it.

Artistic statement

After ten years of being immersed in the world of plants, observing the tiniest details of the surface of bark, petals, transparencies and opacities, and in creating painting where the messages are silent, whispered, hidden amongst the leaves, I felt the need to use a stronger, more active and immediate language, capable of communicating with the public clearly and strongly.

In the Earthly Paradise project, I went back to these plants I painted in my watercolors and brought them together, making them overlap and joining them. I made them much larger, I multiplied the size to increase the force of their language. The plant becomes large because the message that has to get across is important and far-reaching. It is more exciting to see it in its amplified dimensions, it surrounds us, it is as though we go into it, touch it and caressed by it. The embrace of the forest, a green embrace, a marvellous environment that we have received.

It represents a world we can see, but which we do not perceive and which we do not hear, we have to see it enlarged to understand its importance and uniqueness, to stop and let it speak, to listen to it to feel it close, as an indispensable part of our present life.

I portray the forest trying to show them in all their dignity and strength, showing them off to their best and asking for their respect. We live in wonderfull world, very rich in life, but we do not know how to protect it.

It is my hope that all the forms of life in Nature do not become a distant echo, a memory for a few, but but that they will always be a source of life that is physically present.

SHORT BIO:

born in Bergamo, Italy (1974), studied painting in Belle Arti di Brera in Milan, after her diploma she moved to Brazil and spent almost a year in the Natural Reserve of Quebrangulo where her research get started. She is still works and lives in Brazil since 1999 married to the Brazilian sculptor Mello Witkowski Pinto.

SOLO SHOWS (selection):

2008

-Brasil Selvagem. CCL-Centro de Cultura e Lazer “Poeta António Zoppi” – Americana (SP) – Brasile Sculture di Mello Witkowski Pinto e Dipinti di Margherita Leoni.

- Programa Petrobras Ambiental 2008-2012. Edificio Petrobras, Rio de Janeiro, con la presenza del Sig. Carlos Minc, Ministro dell’Ambiente. Sculture di Mello Witkowski Pinto e Dipinti di Margherita Leoni.

- Paradiso Terrestre. GAMeC, Galleria d’Arte Moderna e Contemporanea di Bergamo, Spazio Parola Immagine. Curatore M. Cristina Rodeschini Galati (Direttore d’Istituto GAMeC). Catalogo con testi di Gabriele Rinaldi, M.Cristina Rodeschini Galati e Margherita Leoni.

- IV BAF 2008. Bergamo Arte Fiera 2008. Special Courtesy L’Immagine e AngelArt Gallery, Milano.

2007

- Margherita Leoni, solo arte botanica? Galleria d’arte Salamon&C, Milano.

2006

- Da un paese lontano. Margherita Leoni e Luciano Pinto. Galleria d’Arte Arsmedia, Bergamo. Catalogo con testi di Domenico Montalto, Ezio Francesco Grisanti e Lucia Tongiorgi Tomasi.

2005

- Nei segreti della Foresta Brasiliana. Galleria d’arte Salamon&C, Milano.

2004

- Messaggi brasiliani. Personale di Margherita Leoni. Parco botanico del Cantone Ticino, Isole di Brissago, Svizzera, Museo cantonale di storia naturale di Lugano. Catalogo. Testi di Gabriele Rinaldi e Harry Salamon.

2003

- De Fleur en Fleur. Galleria d’arte Salamon&C, Milano.

2002

- Orquíderas brasileiras, un viaggio in Brasile, uno sguardo al Ticino. Museo Cantonale di Storia Naturale, Lugano, Svizzera.

2001

- Margherita Leoni. Le orchidee e la Foresta Tropicale. Galeria d’arte Salamon&C, Milano. Catalogo.

1999

- La Foresta Atlantica brasiliana. Istituto Italo-Latino Americano (IILA) Roma .