Sofia Fresia and Michele Rigoni Dual Art Exhibition

New exhibition proposal featuring two highly interesting artists: a duo exhibition with Sofia FRESIA and Michele RIGONI.
Two very different artistic languages and technical explorations, both of absolute fascination.
S. Fresia, with her gaze deeply focused on contemporary themes, and M. Rigoni, who looks to the past to identify elements still highly relevant today.

SOFIA FRESIA
Presentation by Elana Radovix
«I do not paint to reproduce an image, mimesis should not be understood as a mere replication of a face or object, but as an imitation of what I understand to be the fundamental movement of the world». Kiefer

The oil paintings on canvas by young Turin artist Sofia Fresia, exhibited at iKonica Art Gallery in Milan from February 3 to 15, 2025, evoke a dreamlike and surreal dimension.
I have known Sofia since our time at the Accademia di Belle Arti in Turin, where she graduated in Painting under Professor Giuseppe Leonardi. I observed, as she painted in silence, her concentration, determination, and innate talent already visible in her early works. I was intrigued by her subjects, her gesture and the vibrancy of her color combinations. Since then, her experience has grown and matured through mobility; Erasmus in France, the numerous artist residencies in recent years, including Via Farini, Casa Walser, ALA, and the many awards she has received: Arte Laguna, Combat, Candiani, Nocivelli.
Sofia initially drew inspiration from the surrealist painting of René Magritte and the metaphysical works of Giorgio de Chirico, later joined by contemporary masters like Edward Hopper, David Hockney, Anselm Kiefer, and Lorraine Shemesh.

Two elements are consistently present in her work: the mountain and the water of swimming pools. These elements are not merely the product of the artist’s imagination. They are not idealized landscapes, but representations of places and spaces she has traveled through and lived in, from both her swimming and hiking experiences. They are places and spaces where the artist immersed herself in life, intimately explored with her sensitivity, and now live within her inner world, materializing through her masterful brushstrokes in artistic creations.

These are the places that saved her during a long illness that Sofia triumphed over. Alpine landscapes, empty swimming pools, abandoned objects serve as metaphors for the inner spaces that alternate between abysses and peaks, between fragility and strength, between fear and courage, in a continuous affirmation of a balance that has been hard-earned.
These timeless elements intersect, overlap, and meet without interruption on the canvas, with no beginning, no end, and no boundaries; they form the backdrop for solitary human figures, motionless and suspended in space like atemporal simulacra in an ongoing process that reconstructs vision and redefines life’s perspectives with intention.
Hieratic figures emerge into an endless, present moment, facing the depths of still water mirrors and silently observing the inevitable and unfathomable precipices of human existence. Often autobiographical, the figures dive in confident plunges, like free flights into the unknown of a cosmos that embraces them, directing us toward the questions and answers of our uncertain time.

As the artist states: “I want to talk about new beginnings, about what it feels like to turn the page or embark on something different. There’s often a sense of jumping into the dark, but in this hyperconnected world, it’s almost never a private leap; we also have to face those who watch and often judge our first attempts.”
Sofia Fresia’s art speaks to those who transform the world, crossing it and opening up new possible worlds, clarifying its meaning first to herself.
Her vibrant paintings create a connection, returning to us a multiplicity of feelings and emotions, reconnecting us to the echo of a profound resonance in the shared cause of life itself.

MICHELE RIGONI
Always connected to the world of images and video, he began his artistic journey in 2022, exploring themes of the construction of “new memories” through the reworking of images from our past.

He uses old postcards, memory albums, photographs collected at markets or from intimate drawers—everything rigorously dated and that has “traveled,” everything that speaks of people, possible loves, group friendships, places of pleasure, forgotten landscapes, and the curiosity of exploration. It’s like saying that time—through experiences—is not so different from today for each of us, in the precarious balance between the desire to go and the desire to stay, between passionate love and nostalgia for absence, between the difficulty of loneliness and the dreams of paradise.
When he finds the right composition, he cuts, pastes, and then draws because he feels the need to expand the boundaries of the image, imagining possible worlds or simply thinking of life’s atoms and a “what if…”

Through his works, the artist invites the viewer to reflect on the value and permanence of tangible memories—those we can touch and pass down, maintaining an intimate and unique quality, as well as a modernity that emerges through the graphic mark.
His work is entirely analog, with no digital intervention, almost as if he wants to reclaim a daily life that no longer belongs to us.