Gaze

Year of composition: 2024

Size: cm 50 x 51

Artist: Leonardo Scarpelli

Lady with blue-green eyes. The beautiful girl in the artwork is looking at something unknown to us which causes her mixed feelings: through her eyes we can read sadness, from the expression on her face, but it could also be a feeling of nostalgia towards something she cannot have. The magnetic gaze that the girl gives us allows us to develop different possible interpretations of the painting, and it is precisely this characteristic that makes it so engaging.

Curiosities:

The meaning of this color is deep. Some legends said "People with blue eyes are very jealous of their belongings and in general of the objects that they consider to be their property. This is a distinctive element of their character. But paradoxically they are not jealous of their partners, or they are jealous to a much lesser extent than they are of objects. In fact, those with blue eyes tend to trust people a lot. On the one hand this is an advantage. But on the other hand, these are people who tend to trust others too much, and are often naive. And finally, people with blue eyes tend to fall in love easily".

After all, the eyes are the most expressive part of the face and the mirror of the soul, a sort of portal between the material and spiritual world, between the conscious and the unconscious, between rationality and magic and for many civilizations of various eras and various latitudes they have been the object of artistic and symbolic representations. 

In fact, the girl is represented with an almost cartoonish look as if she were the protagonist of a comic. 

One of the most popular amulets of the Mediterranean is the Greek Eye, a talisman that comes in the form of a flat drop whose interior contains several circles in various shades of blue, light blue and white and which symbolizes an eye. It guarantees protection against the power of evil, dark forces and negative energies.

The ancestral belief of the protective eye from evil influences was expressed by the Turks, in the Anatolia region, through an amulet, called "the Greek Eye" or "the Turkish Eye", with shades of blue capable of repelling the evil eye and any other negative feeling. A legend tells that a coastal Turkish population had to move a large boulder, but one hundred men together failed to do so. 

Then they called a local inhabitant with blue eyes known as the bearer of the evil eye and led him in front of the large stone which shattered under the astonished gaze of those present. In the Aegean countries it is rare to find people with blue eyes, so it seems that the belief spread according to which light eyes were the main bearers of the evil eye. Coloring the amulet blue served, therefore, to exorcise the effect of evil and to repel its negative energies.

An original and authentic hand-made artwork created whith the antique technique of Commesso Fiorentino which is unique for Florence.

Commesso Fiorentino was born with Medici family, one of the most important families in Florence, in the second half of 1500.

The research of the stones is made by the mosaicist that must be able to choose from a rich and wide range of shades and veins: for this reason the artists personally search and collect the stones retracing the paths of the Medici researchers.

The processing starts by drawing the subject on adhesive paper, that is then cut into small tamplates that will be attached to the variegated shades of the stones following the visual instinct, the innate gift of the artist and his perfect knowledge of the materials. The shape of the little piece will be cut by hand with a chestnut, cherry or hazelnut wood bow and an iron wire that flows with abrasive powder and water. It creates a very precise and inclined cut to form the essential spaces to accommodate the glue, made by artisans with beeswax and pine tree resin. The different stones are previously glued onto a slate surface which acts as a support during the cutting and filing phase. The various pieces which form the composition are adjusted in shape with diamond files, glued together so that the joints are invisible, flattened and finally polished in order to create a perfect decorative harmony showing the colors of nature in all their radiance.