Alberto Mattia Martini
Art critic
According to Hinduism, the cycle of earthly humanity, also known as Manvantara, is divided into four ages or periods. The first is the Golden Age, or Age of Truth, where wisdom so deeply pervades human beings that they are true deities. The second period is the Silver Age, the age of fires or rituals. The third is the Bronze Age, characterized by indecision. Finally, there is the Iron Age, or Age of Conflict—the age in which we currently live, which has lasted for six thousand years, predating all human-known dates and what we define as history.
We can therefore affirm that, according to this vision, we are witnessing a profound involution of humanity—a decline in the knowledge, spiritual power, and sensitivity that originally defined us. It is a period that perfectly mirrors the world we live in today: a time of economic and moral decay, where priority is increasingly given to appearances, and where matter triumphs over essence.
Pessimism, however, must not and cannot overpower human nature or the innate spirituality that defines us; primordial knowledge has merely been 'hidden.' As the history of myth reminds us, something has been lost and balance seems broken, yet we must not despair. On the contrary, myths teach us that this very loss must become the core focus of our quest. Once found, it will mark the beginning of a new cycle, in perfect harmony with the rest of creation.
Psychoanalysis teaches us that before any radical change, one should allow thoughts and the unconscious to flow freely, attempting to delve into the depths of the human psyche. This is precisely what Nicoletta Bagatti aims to achieve through her artistic research: she seeks to bring In Nude forth herself, her own intimate sensitivity, in order to explore and delve into the human soul. The goal that Bagatti has set for herself is a demanding, even arduous task—one that requires determination, a deep knowledge of the spiritual, and an investigative sensitivity, both directed toward analyzing the subtlest nuances of physical form and character.
Observing the works of the Parma-born artist, it would be easy and obvious to draw comparisons to Michelangelo’s work—to those so-called Michelangeloesque bodies that have undoubtedly played, and continue to play, a decisive role in Nicoletta’s training and research. Nevertheless, the body here is a medium, a 'pretext' to emphasize how, in the contemporary era, humanity is facing an essential need to understand and discover its own origins: the memory of the self. Art certainly possesses, deep within its core, the power to snatch the light of eternal life from the passage and oblivion of time.
Seneca affirms that glory is the shadow of virtue, and just like a shadow, it sometimes walks ahead of us, and at other times follows behind. I do not believe that Nicoletta Bagatti’s artistic purpose is mere glory; on the contrary, observing her work and engaging with her, what emerges is an undeniably determined personality, driven within her creative vortex primarily by an inner necessity—an expressive desire that is the hallmark of those endowed with a delicate sensitivity, who often prefer to remain in the shadows rather than step into the limelight.
A shadow that is the very genesis of Bagatti’s work, the soul from which that which will become the beating heart of the depicted subject slowly takes shape.
The support upon which the idea becomes reality is wood—the panel onto which the artist applies a mixture previously prepared with gesso powder and ochre pigment. During the drying phase, stains and shadows emerge from the material, taking on human forms in Nicoletta’s eyes: limbs and sections of bodies that, in their continuous and irrepressible movement, twist and writhe, attempting to emerge from nothingness toward the light. It is at this precise moment that the artist seizes the instant and freezes it in eternity using charcoal, swiftly outlining the real or envisioned image, before later stepping in with the allure of irreplaceable oil colors.
Imagination, fantasy, and the capacity to perceive and envision figures where nothing appears to the eyes of others, have always been a defining trait of Nicoletta's; a way to let fantasy flow freely and attempt to reach a level of understanding of the human soul that goes skin-deep, penetrating the dark depths of the mind.
The entire creation, and thus humanity itself, remains a mystery that science, with good reason, attempts to solve and explain. There is, however, another path that science cannot provide—the ability to see both the visible and the invisible: this is the creative force, the power of fantasy and imagination, a gift reserved exclusively for art.
These hands, these feet, these torsos are not a virtuous academic exercise, but human matter—or rather, sentiments, ideas, and desires that have emerged from the psyche, seeking liberation from human anxieties, but also from mediocrity and selfishness.
The often pronounced and deliberately foregrounded centrality of the hand and the foot conceptually recalls the canvases of Egon Schiele, specifically the meaning that the hand assumes as it reaches out in search of contact and exchange with the surrounding world.
The hand—the primary gesture with which we offer ourselves, presenting ourselves to those we do not know—becomes the starting point for a journey into intimacy. This intimacy is understood as an analysis of the private universe and the secret that the human figure carries within, exploring its fears, anxieties, and apprehensions.
The hand is also the medium through which the artist expresses and directly reveals herself—the gestural expression that animates the connection between intellect and emotion, an element that intercedes by mediating the relationship between physicality and sentiment.
These works, therefore, are Nicoletta Bagatti’s response to today’s world—a world to which, while we must acknowledge its undeniable and obvious social and technological developments, we must equally recognize and firmly reject the desire to reduce the human being to a mere producer and consumer, standardizing choices and behaviors.
What, then, better than the cube—with its powerful sense of immobility—can represent materiality? It is that existence as something solid, rather than spiritual, which paradoxically allows it to rise as an image of eternity.
Unexpectedly and suddenly, the image becomes three-dimensional, 'infecting' the geometric figure of the cube, enveloping its shape and dimension, and inviting us to abandon all the superfluous baggage that accompanies our daily lives.
The thirst for knowledge drives us to question what lies hidden inside these cubes—a blend of curiosity and apprehension that sparks enveloping speculations in our minds. The sense of emptiness, of disorientation, paradoxically leads us to a place where material vacuity has been replaced by human presence.
Giulio Gallo
Doctor in History and Social Criticism of Art.
What lies at the foundation of Socratic maeutics is a thought that today, twenty-five centuries later, still accompanies us and, mysteriously, finds no definitive answer within the philosophical spectrum. If aesthetics is defined as the science of sensory knowledge—that way of harmoniously engaging our senses when facing a painting, a face, or a thought that stimulates our natural predisposition to emotion—then we can do nothing but confront everything we do not know, everything that surrounds our cognitive framework and makes us live in an almost parallel world: a 3D Platonic cave in which we dwell daily, well aware of what awaits us outside.
But we are even more aware that our certainties, our securities—imposed by a general, collective effervescence—guarantee that we do not think, do not reflect, and consequently, do not ask ourselves questions.
This is why standing before a painting that initially seems to express what we, externally, define as ugly, must—and indeed forces and compels us to—reflect upon what this thought asserts: namely, that 'anesthetic' is the antithesis of 'aesthetic'—the numbing of the senses.
And consequently, aesthetic thought can do nothing less than awaken within us that sense of belonging to life that only a work of art, as such, can reawaken.
PATRIZIA BARLETTANI
Nicoletta’s eyes.
When I think of Nicoletta, her eyes immediately come to mind—dark, deep, eyes shining with intelligence and curiosity.
Eyes that know how to look and discover hidden worlds within the simplest details, within the most ordinary objects.
And through her eyes, her painting is born—telling us of the little gems hidden within a river stone, a piece of fruit, or an everyday object; or, as in this solo exhibition, pausing to investigate the genius of Picasso through his symbols and icons.
I like her meticulous and attentive painting, I like her playfulness with objects, I like the freshness she manages to imprint upon the panel—which reflects her very soul—but above all, I like her desire to challenge herself and to search within for new forms of expression, without any fear of putting herself on the line each and every time.
Fly free, Nicoletta, and never lose your desire to play.
MARILENA BURATTI
Nicoletta, a bright smile!
A lover of simple things, though highly critical of herself and always in debate with her inner self.
A volcano in continuous motion, yet with a controlled eruption, directed toward a constant release—one that is necessary to give form to the magma that restlessly torments her.
Her works are the evidence of this research—closed cycles of very specific moments of study and confrontation, even with figures possessing their own distinct physiognomy.
This study and encounter with the great Picasso has led her to seek an answer to the continuous questioning of what the purpose of her obstinacy in painting truly is... can one paint solely for the pleasure of doing so, or is there something more at the very bottom of her soul?
Hers is a journey of which the end cannot be seen... simply because it doesn't exist.