Natalie Giugni is a New Jersey based fine artist creating two and three-dimensional works using multiple mediums including chalk pastel, paint, bone, wood, and metal. She is graduate of School of Visual Arts where she attended on a full scholarship. Born in Venezuela, she has traveled extensively, and has drawn inspiration and narratives for her work from her experiences in Italy, South America, and Japan. She now spends her time exhibiting nationally and internationally, while working out of her home studio in Jersey City, NJ.
Natalie leads The New York Society of Women’s Artists, an organization which was founded in 1925, as its current president. Early in her career, her participation in a year-long gilding project in the Russian Consulate, NYC, restoring the original moldings in 23K gold, influenced her to explore the use of metals in her painting and sculpture, a defining feature which remains to this day.
One of Natalie's strengths is great diversity in her work: Contrasted to the delicate precision required when working with gold leaf, is the boldness and humor exhibited in a project she completed for a Children's Aid benefit at Lincoln Center, where she produced a twelve-foot replica of Judy Garland's ruby slippers from the Wizard of Oz.
The title of this exhibition, Bones in Motion, contains a double meaning: Bones in Motion calls forth Giugni’s process of drawing and abstracting her bone sculptures to inform her paintings and develop her visual vocabulary. It also references a time of “getting back to work” and production. The latter alludes to the artist’s journey after the lengthy lockdown of the pandemic, followed by a bout with ill health.
Natalie Giugni’s latest creations examine classical themes such as death and rebirth, confinement, liberation, wretchedness, and beauty in two- and three-dimensional compositions. She sometimes executes these with solemn regard and, in other instances, with tongue-in-cheek humor. Her new series gives new life to bits and pieces of bones and mythology through the deconstruction and abstraction of their imagery.
“In-depth exploration and thorough enjoyment of the process of art making have led me to develop a unique approach to creating my work: Forms are studied through sculpture, and the contours of these objects are overlapped and abstracted using mixed media, paints, and pastels. Hence, the progression in the development of my work is from 3D to 2D. As I paint, I frequently turn the canvas, altering the direction of the shape and weight of the composition. This acts as the catalyst to my painting process: Dynamic instances arise between the layers as combinations of color, shape, and texture prompt my thoughts and reactions. I am careful to balance my role as a "creator" and a "facilitator."
In this manner, by taking shapes from the outer world and abstracting them, I am also able to study the images that arise from my inner, psychological world. The development of the surface of the work depicts the flow of events from the entire course of the piece; permitting the spectator to experience my paintings from the initial sketch to the end image. Thus, transporting the viewer from the tangible artwork through the psychological process."
- Natalie Giugni, 2022
To learn more about artist Natalie Giugni, please visit www.nataliegiugni.com.