Les âmes de la terre

The exhibition "THE SOULS OF THE EARTH" brings together Marina Manceron’s photographs and Monica Mariniello’s clay and bronze sculptures in an intimate narrative. Marina Manceron offers a unique interpretation of landscapes and natural elements, revealing unsettling parallels with stories from ancient Greece. These portraits blend imagination and reason, the visible and the invisible, and invite a poetic meditation on these unexpected connections between nature and mythology. She draws inspiration from the history of art, which she studied in France and Italy, and through her photographic practice explores the intuitive relationship between humans and nature, seeking to reveal an invisible and sensitive bond that unites living beings. Her approach blends contemplation and exploration, highlighting this interdependence among living beings, which are part of a Whole: the Anima Mundi, or the soul of the world. Marina Manceron lives and works near Arles. Monica Mariniello, a sculptor, lets the colors of earth and bronze speak for themselves. Primitive art acts within her like a powerful surgery of the soul. She is always seeking life within the material. She works directly on the raw material, using a knife. From animal to human, from human to animal, she scrutinizes the animated essence of moving, living forms. Her bodily beings are primal creatures, barely emerged from their original matrix, and an air of serenity sanctifies their rugged presence. Born in Siena, Tuscany, Italian culture permeates her work. A certain theatricality, accompanied by a veiled, slightly dark humor, blends with a quest for harmony. Whether humans or animals, whatever they may be, the soul must be present, infusing the material with life, making the gaze vivid and the nature of the being legible. Monica Mariniello lives and works in the Paris region.