Federica Poletti

Poletti’s creatures reveal the depths of human emotion—fear, desire, and frustration—transformed through entry into a magical realm. These beings, often solitary and liberated female figures, dissolve or merge with natural or artificial matter, becoming visible symbols that no longer seek dialogue with our world. This silent realm is inhabited by ancient chthonic forces, sacred animals, and whispering plants that protect and absorb fragmented bodies. They are not anatomies but symbols—mythic and folkloric presences whose meaning remains ambiguous, guarding arcane secrets that the painter merges into her material. Poletti manipulates surfaces—mixing hair and tears, scratching and burning faces, tattooing layers of paint—to expose an unfinished alchemy, the unsolved mystery of the psyche. Her lunar, archetypal imagery—Diana’s deer, transforming Naiads—connects deeply with contemporary sensibility through the raw, iconoclastic power of her material painting.