2016 – Betrothed – Mixed technique – 73x48cm

BRIDE TO BE

This work originates from Findings which happen in the streets as well as behind dusty bookshelves and furniture left in fogotten attics.

I have always been struck by the austere looks in beginning of century Portraits.  Perhaps it is because photographs were rare and only used for special occurences as births and marriages.

I like to look at this woman as an ancestor of the house I inhabit, a photograph which was shot and printed before the nuptials in Milan.

Since the Renaissance, the theme of Man’s centrality and the renewed interest in the natural world significally influenced Art, determining, amongst other things, the blossoming of new genres such as the portrait.  From the second half of the fifteenth century, in particular, there was a rebirth of the autonomous private portrait genre.

As in renaissance portraits, in which the physical appearance was accompanied by symbolic objects whose function was to refer to the social or moral prestige of the subject, in this work I have inserted extraneous elements.  Small objects and symbolic animals inspired by sacred paintings which allow me to tell something more on the subject, especially regarding her inward sphere.

The Bride to Be that I have imagined wears  white lace on her head, a Lily on her vest as a symbol of purity, and next to her is a parrot, often associated with Mary for her “ave” verse, referring to the Annunciation and of the destiny of Woman as a bride.

What I am interested in discovering through this work and in opposition to renaissance iconography, in which all is subject to roles and preestablished destinies, is that of “Everyday promises” which are suspended in rarefied space and time. The promises we make ourselves first and foremost, those which are born from desires, those which can be kept or those which we have never had the courage to make,  which can last a second or a lifetime.

I would like that this Bride to Be who is endowed with a parrot, a recorder and a notebook be considered by the viewer as a more or less sacred place, similar to a soap bubble within which each of us can reveal his or herself.