Border
Manuela Vallicelli
2025
powder pigments on canvas
100 cm x 150 cm
At first glance, the painting “Border” by Manuela Vallicelli could represent a landscape. There seem to be mountains at the left background, perhaps a lake or bay in front of it. In the central foreground, one might recognise dunes whose almost white sand is streaked by dark lines. Or is it rather a plateau with sedimentary depositions? Or even a snowy landscape? At the right hand, this form is abruptly interrupted by a furrow, or better by lines in grey shades, which proceed to the horizon. They might dissipate in another basin of water. Above this landscape, vaults an overcast sky. Besides clouds in blue-grey-white shades, a supernatural red is dominant. A light source is not definable, a presumed sun is hidden.
Depending on the personal experience, the contemplator might identify landscapes of their memory. One might think of a lagoon, a snowy landscape or a salt lake area? Could it even be a surface mine or something else? However, the mystic sky is irritating. Does the reddening originate after all from a sunrise or sunset? Is it a kind of an aurora? Could it be pollution and with that alarming?
All these speculations are allowable and are at the same time unreliable. Manuela creates her landscapes from her own personal souvenirs, perhaps sometimes from a certain collective memory and from her inner perception. Before working at the canvas, she has an idea what she desires to depict and how to realise it. Then she lets guide herself by her intuition. Evidently, the pictorial execution is close to abstraction, since the colour fields and lines didn’t form specific objects. Colours meet and shape the surface of the canvas. Layers and a certain depth arise from brighter and darker surfaces, which merge partly.
The result are hypothetic spaces, which might be found somewhere or have existed. Like in our example, there is no evident story told by the painting but a flaring of a remembrance. Also, the title, “Border” didn’t guide to a special reading, whereas it opens even more possibilities. The artist herself has chosen the title, because the image is for her the limit where mystery lies beyond. Therefore, Manuela’s paintings are open for various interpretations. We can contemplate the landscapes, immerse in it and let the spirit flow.
Manuela Vallicelli
Born in 1971 in Ancona, Italy, Manuela Vallicelli lived during her childhood in Nigeria. After her return to Italy at the age of 13, she completed her studies at the Liceo Artistico (Art High School) and at the Accademia di Belle Arti in Ravenna, the family’s city of origin, where she specialised in painting. Additionally, she attended courses in theory and practice of pictorial restoration. Moreover, she went to the Facultad de Bellas Artes in Barcellona, Spain for one semester. Graduated as Master of Arts cum laude the young artist moved to Milan, where she confirmed her abilities by solo exhibitions and participations in group shows.
Since the beginning of her career, Manuela experimented in different techniques. In addition to painting, she expressed herself in photography, sculpture and theatre, even though she always maintained her first media. First, she focussed on figures, who became more and more transparent, until they completely vanished into nature. While creating natural ambiences, she also tried to eliminate the line of the horizon. In doing so, she never made abstract pictures. Her images constantly have something organic. However, she changed her point of view. Instead of being inspired by the existing, she concentrated on her inner eye. The artist wants to make visible what seemingly isn’t.
With this approach, Manuela paints pictures, which often remind landscapes, natural phenomena like cloudy skies or cavities. Contemplators frequently think to recognise environments, even though they arise from the artist’s mind. Her forms and colours are painted with natural powder pigments. These colours of the Earth are an additional approach to nature. Memories from her African childhood, places where she travelled to, or images of a certain collective memory might enter. With her inner intuition she conceives her ideas about a painting and executes this on the canvas.
Since her return to Ravenna, Manuela also makes short videos. Recurrently she pics up historical subjects related to the history of her hometown like “Builder of the past. Ravenna.” or “Sister Beatrice Alighieri, Dante’s daughter” on occasion of the 700th anniversary of Dante Alighieri’s death. Another approach is more personal. For “Into the Garden” she filmed her own garden. For “African Rising”, she integrated family photos of her childhood which are overlapped by recordings of trees and leaves, accompanied by bird’s twittering. She applied this technique of coalesces also to other films creating many new images and allowing the contemplator to immerse into her universe.
Besides many personal and group exhibitions in Milan and Ravenna, Manuela’s works were also presented in other Italian cities; Nice, France; Monte Carlo, Monaco; London, Great Britain and Beijing, China. Her most recent show “Altrove” (Elsewhere) was in April 2025 at the gallery BoA Spazio Arte in Bologna.
Manuela lives and works in Ravenna.