Giulia Mangoni

Giulia Mangoni is an Italian-Brazilian artist whose practice revolves around the ethics of return; she is interested in creating orchestrated interventions through the lens of painting in order to deconstruct notions of memory and identity linked to specific geographies and decentralized communities. Her work develops through visual methods of personal narration, often the result of a dialogue with several voices, whose influences, relationships, and contributions help to create works that temporarily solidify this process of knowledge and world building in continuous evolution.

Giulia Mangoni in between paintings , 2024, artist’s studio, photo by Matteo Serafini

Hello! Can you introduce yourself?

My name is Giulia Mangoni and I am an artist living and working in Italy. I am predominantly a painter, although my work sometimes expands into other disciplines.

What does your practice consist of? What does a normal day at your space/studio look like? 

My practice starts with world-building in specific communities, and emerges from relational collaborations that may take years to establish. Elements of this world-building eventually make their way into my studio. My practice in this is twofold, with half belonging outside the studio and the other inside – half relational, half introspective and independent. The relational part of my work happens when I explore the territory around me, when I meet artisans and farmers, other people who work with their hands often to create or maintain objects, animals or plants. This consists of a series of appointments scattered over the month’s agenda. The studio-based part of my work consists in clocking in working hours, painting in the studio with a lunch break. What connects the two worlds is the act of drawing. Drawing summarises the ‘out of studio’ and brings it in the studio, so that these experiences can make their way into the paintings.

Un Lirio nel Fibreno, 2024, Oil on linen, 2 x 1.8 m, courtesy ArtNoble Gallery photo by Michela Pedranti

If you can trace it back in time, how did your practice begin? What was that first gesture or impulse?

I was lucky to have been exposed to the joy of painting from a young age, as something fun to do. When I was younger, I was taught that disciplined drawing was a way of engaging deeply with the world around you, which I found challenging and exciting. As a young adult, I followed this path, oscillating between painting as a physical, almost instinctual act, and drawing as a preparatory, studied discipline.

Can you share a personal story or experience of yourself initiating a creative process and how your hands played a crucial role? 

I’ve been drawing steadily for a couple of years now. When I first started, I was developing acute pains at the bottom of my hand, with a sort of repetitive movement that was causing me tendinitis. This caused me to shift the way I worked.  I had to relearn how to draw. Through my relearning, I realised that I had been drawing quite rigidly until then, sticking to only one type of grip. I learned that there were many ways to hold drawing tools, and many places of the body from which the movement emerged. I remembered that the whole shoulder is involved in the hand, and that the elbow has an impact, and that depending on your grip, you can activate certain parts of your body and not others. This led me to increase my variety of grips and it’s become a physical reminder not to stagnate in one style or manner of doing things for too long.

How does a slow and reflective approach to your craft impact the final outcome of your work?

Layers are very important to my work. Often my intervention in a specific painting limits itself to one colour a day. This allows me to fully work in a mood from start to finish and to come back the next day and react differently to the same image. It’s important for me to sleep and come back with fresh eyes. I also often take photos, print them, and look at my work in another dimension, far from the studio, which allows me to see where I need to go. I feel that the time given to a painting is really important, so that each layer remains energetic. Even if there is a process that covers the initial marks, I’ve been taught to always let all the layers emerge at least once in the composition. This can only happen if I allow time for the painting to settle and if I don’t rush the layering process to reach a deadline for example. 

Detail of: La Faeta, 2024, wall painting for Internazionali BNL d’Italia, curated by Giorgio Galotti, courtesy Operativa Arte Contemporanea, photo by Giorgio Benni

How much is your creativity influenced by the community around you?

I receive input in terms of subjects from the community around me. I’ve been working with ideas of territorial self-identification for the last few years, but the especially creative work that makes up the paintings happens in the studio alone. I’m often working with people who use their hands in the creation of objects and situations. In the past, I’ve photographed and drawn these hands in order to pay homage to them. Sometimes I bring in objects that artisans have created to dialogue with my work, but it’s important to me that their mark remains their own. 

What advice would you offer to people who want to deepen their creativity through manual practices in their everyday lives?

Practise something manual each day if you want to improve it, The hands have an intelligence of their own. If you have a creative impulse and an overstimulated intellect, ground your creativity in making, and start with the body. Get your hands dirty, choose materials that you can’t control easily to begin with, so that you can get out of your head as quickly as possible. Leave your ideas at the door and let the manual process take precedence for long periods of time. See what happens when you do that.

Giulia Mangoni work in progress for ‘Tramonto con Galline’, 2024, Courtesy of Operativa Arte Contemporanea

Thanks for reading. You can follow Giulia’s practice and research on Instagram.