BIO
Luigia Martelloni was born in Rome, Italy. She received her MFA from the prestigious Accademia di Belle Arti di Roma, where she developed her unique visual aesthetic, which rooted in the modern avant-garde, is largely absorbed by detachment from conventions.
Influenced by the Italian Arte Povera movement, her ouvre is inspired by artistic freedoms liberated by Duchamp's readymades and framed by the literary and psychological rhetorics surrounding the surrealist movement.
Upon completion of her master degree, Ms Martelloni went to live in New York, the city that held her first solo exhibition. She began an ambitious year long project in which she traveled around the United States and Central America, a journey of self-exploration to study the art and the culture of Americans. Inspired by her travels, she began to exhibit her work in Rome and New York. Her painting, photographs and installations were the result of her journey.
Her artist practice thus developed a focus on uncovering hidden layers of truth, exploring dimensions of collective unconscious and subjective interpretation.
Martelloni captures the ephemeral and affixes the transient into enduring works which transcend artistic subjectivity and find new meaning within a spectator. Aiming to achieve intimate reciprocity between artist and the viewer, she focuses on process and tactility, and is increasingly concerned with the relationship between object and space, and the richness of perceptual experience, evolution and transformation.
Recognized for her frame of concept and multidimensional expression, Martelloni's work has been exhibited across the USA and Europe.
Among many exhibitions: one person solo shows presented by Museo Laboratorio d'Arte Contemporanea, University of Rome La Sapienza. Spazio Italia Gallery at Italian Cultural Institute Los Angeles, The Loft at Liz's Gallery, Gallery 825 and Vorpal Gallery in New York.
Her work was included at Santa Monica Museum of Art, Torrance Art Museum, XII Quadriennale Nazionale d'Arte di Roma., Mopla (Month of Photography in Los Angeles) and featured at the “Italian Pavilion of the World” 54th International Art Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, Italy.
Furthered by her post graduate training in Film and Photography, her multidimensional oevre encompasses performance, still images and video.
Her interest in filmmaking eventually led her to work in the movie industry in Rome.
With cross-disciplinary reach, the artistic repertoire includes creative collaborations with Francis Ford Coppola, Dean Tavoularis and Luigi Comencini, among many others, and reflects a roster of acclaimed theatre productions and documentary films.
Recently, she organized and curated an outdoor exhibition in Santa Monica: De-Fence Art (Art in the time of Isolation) as a result of the Covid-19 lockdown. It involved more then 35 artists, hanging their work on the fences at the Santa Monica Airport.
In 2018/2019 she invited more then 50 international artists to participate in a project called: “Between Two Seas”. It comprised of 3 exhibitions between Italy and Los Angeles. The exhibitions created a connection of cultures through the artistic project with the theme of immigration/emigration.
In 2014 she directed and produced "SMARTists" a documentary into the life and work of a community artists in Santa Monica.
Luigia Martelloni works and resides between Los Angeles and Rome where she continues her pluralistic practice of subverting conventions in the stride towards new discoveries.
“Luigia Martelloni took my Art History courses in the Accademia di Belle Arti di Roma, graduating summa cum laude with a profound and brilliant thesis on the influence primitive cultures had on the avante-garde in our century.
Luigia Martelloni was immediately distinguished for her intellectual curiosity and originality of research, these qualities bring her towards multiple experiences: from painting to photography, from video to performance.
An essential component of her versatile personality is to always gather information through traveling, study, and direct inquiry, not separating the fantastic and creative aspects from the speculative and the empirical
Even though she currently lives in the United States, Luigia Martelloni is well known and appreciated in Italy as one of the most valid young artists. Proof is her participation in important exhibitions like the XII Nazionale Quadriennale d’Arte di Roma (Palazzo delle Esposizioni, Roma) and her solo exhibition at the Museo Laboratorio di Arte Contemporanea of the University of Rome, La Sapienza and her participation at the 54th International Art Exhibition La Biennale di Venezia."
Prof. Lorenza Trucchi, Art Historian / Critic / Journalist
“Through my art I try to bring messages to the world. I like to conceptualize ideas that tell stories.
I'm interested in the process and follow the idea.
An aspect of my work explores the impact of socio-political issues on cultural landscape, history, identity, migration, race and the human refugee global crisis. I pay attention to the natural world and its relation to humanity, transforming and reinterpreting everyday reality: traces from nature, fragments, geographic places, urban spaces, different cultures. I work with multimedia installations, painting, found material, photography and video.
Often my artwork is inspired by the nature around me. A reflection of our time, the narrative memories and the elements that leave us with fragments of nature. It is also a reflection on the imprints that we inevitably leave in our journey. The traces that define our coexistence, an itinerary of existence in connection with our environment, our planet and humanity.
In my work with trees, I often remove them from their habitat in order to magnify their grace, their beauty, the spread of their branches out in the air, to reveal their unique truth and memorize the moment of the encounter.”
Einstein advised: “Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better”.