Description
The first, the oldest of the great masters: Leonardo da Vinci, believed that the artist’s task was to explore the visible world. There was nothing in nature that did not intrigue him and that did not feed his ingenuity.
I wanted to reinterpret one of his most beautiful paintings – in my humble opinion “La Scapigliata” dating back to around 1508.
The female head is very delicate, the gaze turned downwards.
I was struck by his features: very sweet, the lips that announce a shy smile.
The chiaroscuro enhances the relief and then there are her wavy curls.
Why this painting? This image evokes the “motions of the soul” one of the key principles of Leonardo’s poetics.
In this period I have reflected a lot on the nature and future of this Earth that we will bequeath to our children.
Apart from the threat of viruses and pollution, there are still many underhanded wars for the control of resources and I believe that in our own small way we can make our contribution through our work.
In my reinterpretation I wanted to connect with the nature that so intrigued and inspired the Master.
I used a plaster base and leaves from my garden that I dried and glued and then worked with acrylic.
For the drawing I used sanguine pencils and charcoal (always nature also in the painter’s tools) to finish with the oil brush strokes.
The centuries pass, the Masters pass but theirs works remain. Leonardo worked on a wooden base, I worked on the leaves.
Nature sets the pace. He always presents us with the bill, for better or for worse. She is sweet and fragile like this girl but when she gets angry she can also be relentless.
Every day with every action we take, we get into debt with the Earth, consuming its natural resources. “Despite the pandemic in 2021, humanity lived as if it had the resources of 1.6 Earths” (@will_ita)
The Earth must be preserved because it continues to be (for many artists and not) a means to acquire the knowledge of the world around us and which we need for our art.
