“[..] ancient woods, where a leaf falls,
silent, for every beat of the heart.”
(Giovanni Pascoli, Myricae, The fence, extract)
Light whisper of a leaf that rubs against another one. The leaves never come back onto the tree after falling. Temporary guests. They are unheard voices in the thick air of the woods, suddenly foreign bodies from the branches to the damp soil. Delving into the woods. Overhearing its secrets. Steal them swiftly, the best. Little maps of different shapes, micro-worlds with complex veins. Life that flows, the end of it. The cycle of nature is virtuous and all is combining to keep the harmony. Through the leaves it is expressed the universe of work by Luigi Menichelli and his recent production will be on show at Romberg Gallery.
Into the Woods gathers pulsating sculptural poems. Murmurs of life crystallized in eternal matter. Menichelli is an obsessive picker, often walking with an eye to the ground; the attraction is a strong force like a magnet - perceives, selects, collects, elaborates, manipulates, stratifies. Each work requires a long and meticulous process, that conveys a single reality into the rebirth of the whole. One block consists of many heterogeneously harmonized elements. He lays the leaves one at a time, one above the other, side by side, one around the other, one against another, without smothering any of them, and he makes them dialogue through a ritual and patient gesture. Twigs, buds and small breaths are added and overlapped in a delicate synergy establishing amazing three-dimensional structures, graceful and unbreakable beds at once. A development constituted of individuality dipped in varnish, he let them dry, re-shaped them, then dipped them in color. A bright renewed vitality without losing anything of their history.
Luigi Menichelli arranges marvelously melancholic works in which inside and outside are merged and mingled. They are ethereal mantles hanging on the walls of the gallery, unmovable creatures, and also flying beings that are floating from the ceiling and re-pose like compact clusters of butterflies. They are real matters to be touched with the sensitive skin of our fingers – that are extremities of our body like leaves for the tree – to be smelled and listened to the chanting sealed in their DNA, absorbed by the artist and reverted in the form of colorful notes to the public.
One step at a time we penetrate his woods, in a slight fall, to admire a short journey that from the branch to the ground remains of immanent and immortal beauty. The cycle of nature is fulfilled and… the dried leaves oblivious of this adventure lay on the soil, weary, lose themselves to a new life.

opening : Saturday 8th April 2017 at 6 p.m.

mpefm ITALY art press release