With
a master degree in architecture Michela Cavagna analize materials, spaces and
how light dialogue with them. She started to work with fibers since “I am a
child born in a textile district and I need to be connected with my roots” she says.
In
2015 she moved to Indonesia where her research start to be influenced by the
local culture and from the discovery of corean, indonesian, japanese forms of
art and crafts. Here her work took a new direction, thanks to the study of
ancestral forms of handcraft, and the study and practice of weaving and natural
dyes with indigenous essences as morinda or indigo. She developed her skills
with local artists and artisans and the meaning of design, art, handcraft
totally changed for her.
At
the end of 2017 after the collaborative project Unit Produksi Berita,
dialogue_arts gallery, Michela was invited to have a solo exhibition in the
ITALIAN CULTURAL INSTITUTE in Jakarta.
In
her work she analize themes as fears, death, lonelyness. Her obsession is about
the repetition of a gesture, the cyclicality of life, a constant movement that give forms.
Her
TANGLED series started in 2019 as a little body sculpture. Now the work is becoming
bigger and has a dialogue with architecture, abandoned buildings or interiors.
Those ripetitive and obsessive gesture become a message shared with society
about the fact that everything has a start and an end, but all has a
continuity, and actually never end.
After come back to Italy in 2019 she was
selected for the collective of fiber artists during Paratissima 15 – N.I.C.E.
L'ALTRO CAPO DEL FILO in Torino, Italy. In the same year she received an
honorable mention into the Awagami International Mini Print Exhibition AIMPEE,
Tokushima Japan with a mokuhanga work (another technique she use).
In 2020 is on the
curated exhibition REBIRTHING (standby due to Covid restrictions) Paratissima,
Torino.
Just to mention on
2009 she made handmade felt for the fashion designer Marco De Vincenzo (B.E.S.T. Cittadellarte),
Biella and in 2007 was on the 13x17. 1000 artisti per un'indagine eccentrica
sull'arte in Italia curated by Jean Blanchaert and Philippe Daverio.