Profiles

In this sequence of works, Micaela describes the living and real image of people, the profiles interpreting the possible inner situations of the individuals themselves through the images she has elaborated. In the artist’s intention, the metal plates oxidised with acids and salt and sculpted are intended to give an idea of the possible spiritual state deposited in each of us as a result of the events of daily life, and in particular the latest events that people have had to endure as a result of the recent pandemic. The individual consolidates the main acquisitions that each of us experiences in life, each work is a symbol enclosed in the profile which is the image we know least about ourselves, yet which represents us unequivocally. A face in profile is a strong, essential, recognisable sign and is the only one that can be drawn with one continuous stroke.  These works mean that, despite the enormous differences that separate one from the other, there is a common root for these lives, and the common root is art itself, which brings order, harmony and balance to what may seem to be the height of disorder and chaos, that is, life outside of being. The artist measures himself against images, not abstract but mysterious, at least at first glance, which speak to us of personality.      

The practice, known as circumductio umbrae, indissolubly links art to the idea of reproducing reality and the portrait to the function of recreating the presence of a person.  There is an evident search for personalisation of the faces through an uncommon drawing of the profile. These profiles are directly related to one of the oldest myths about the birth of painting, in which Pliny the Elder traces the origins of art to that distant day when the daughter of a potter in Corinth, in order to preserve in her memory the figure of her beloved, traced on the wall the outline of the shadow cast by the light. The surrounding space, on the other hand, represents the spirituality of the person interacting with the rest of the world. All this is done with a technique already used by the artist of using metal oxidation as pigment for drawing.