In Milan, the observation of nature in the bipersonal exhibition of Linda Carrara and Mikayel Ohanjanyan

BUILDING Art Gallery in Milan presents Naturalis Historia, a two-person exhibition by artists Linda Carrara and Mikayel Ohanjanyan, from Sept. 10 to Oct. 12, 2024. The exhibition project hosts a selection of both sculptural and pictorial works and offers a comparison of their different artistic pursuits that investigate the common theme of nature. The title of the exhibition, Naturalis Historia, which can be translated as “observation of nature,” refers to the treatise by Pliny the Elder (23-79 A.D.), an encyclopedic work containing studies of the natural world. The analysis of the world, understood as natural or human, continues to inspire contemporary art by allowing artists to rework themes such as identity, connection, bonding and duality. Linda Carrara and Mikayel Ohanjanyan, observe their surroundings and translate them with a unique perspective through their art practice.

Linda Carrara investigates the landscape and our perception of nature, revealing in her poetics the double in the world and in human nature. Through various pictorial works, she proposes a project on the uniqueness of the double. From the landscape that doubles and is reflected on the surface of water, to the day and night that, since the dawn of centuries, divide the world into two parts. The works and analysis of the landscape illuminate the multiple aspects of mirroring and doubling, even to the point of investigating the double of our own human nature.

Mikayel Ohanjanyan represents in his sculptures the bonds between human beings in a union of ancient and modern memories. The artist exhibits a basalt work and unpublished sculptures belonging to the series Legami. His research focuses on the human being and the observation of his inner and outer world. According to the artist, “we are connected by invisible bonds,” quoting Nikola Tesla, which allow us to be seismographs of the vibrations emanating from everything around us. A “Whole,” which is defined by space itself, time, nature, matter with its rhythms and forms, and the human being. In connections we rediscover Oneness, that is, our balance with the “Whole,” the cohesion between opposites, also inherent in human nature.

Notes on the artists

Linda Carrara (Bergamo,1984) lives and works between Milan and Brussels. She studied in the contemporary art department at the Brera Academy of Fine Arts (2003 - 2007) and was a studio assistant for Vincenzo Ferrari (2006 - 2012). Between 2014 and 2015, she completed a master’s degree in multimedia arts at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts (KASK) at the University of Ghent in Belgium, and in the same year she did an intership for Michaël Borremans. In his more recent works, his artistic practice has shifted toward a “vitalist” representation of reality: the material and the pictorial action have become the focal point of the work itself, thus breaking free from the purely figurative for a “figural pictorial event.” In this sense, the images presented by the artist do not coincide with the things they describe, but are intended to evoke the primary experience that generated them, the observation to which they refer, their primordial side, almost in a metaphysical narrative of both the pictorial event and the experience from which they arise. The artist recently won the Casarini Due Torri Prize, 2023, at ArtVerona 2023 and was invited to participate in the group exhibition Pittura italiana oggi at the Milan Triennale. In 2013 she was a finalist at the Cairo Prize, and in 2014 she won the Terna Prize - Painting with the work entitled Outer Space.

In 2016 he presents his first solo show at Boccanera Gallery Il pretesto di Lotto curated by Daniele Capra, in 2017 his solo show Looking for the right place at the right moment with writings by Claudio Salvi at Blanco spaces in Ghent, Belgium. In 2018 she opens her exhibition A/R Linda Carrara [born in Bergamo in 1984, lives and works between Brussels and Milan] at the Italian Cultural Institute in Brussels, in 2019 the solo show Madonna of the Rocks at the Iragui Gallery in Moscow and the solo show Chôra at Boccanera Gallery curated by Giuseppe Frangi. In 2020 he participates in the virtual group shows Love is the answer and Boccanera Fiction, in 2021 in the group show Basta at Palazzo Monti in Brescia, and in 2022 in the group show How far should we go? curated by Rossella Farinotti at Fondazione ICA in Milan. In 2023 she transformed her solo show Se il paesaggio è simbolico into a group exhibition in Trento and Milan, opening the dialogue to other artists she considered akin to her poetic research. Her works have been exhibited in numerous private galleries and public institutions in Italy and abroad: Triennale Milan, 2023; Cremona Art Week, 2023; Public Service Gallery, Stockholm, 2023; Boccanera Gallery, Trento/Milan, 2023-2019-2016; MAC, Lissone, 2023; Fondazione ICA, Milan, 2022; Centrul de Interes in Cluj-Napoca, Romania, 2022; Galleria Renata Fabbri, Milan, 2022; Palazzo Reale, Milan, 2021; Floris-Romer Museum, Gyor, Hungary, 2021; Rizzuto Gallery, Palermo, 2020; Iragui Gallery, Moscow, 2019; Istituto Italiano, Brussels, 2018; Blanco Space, Ghent, Belgium, 2017; Fabrica, Moscow, 2016; L.A.C. Centre d’Art Contemporaine, Sigean, France, 2015. He has participated in residencies such as: MOMENTUM, Berlin (2015); LKV Trondheim, Norway (2016); NCCA, St. Petersburg (2017); Musumeci Contemporary, Brussels (2018); Palazzo Monti, Brescia (2020).

Mikayel Ohanjanyan (Yerevan, Armenia, 1976) lives and works between Florence and Carrara. He attended the P. Terlemezyan State High School of Fine Arts in Yerevan (graduating in 1995) and then the Yerevan State Academy of Fine Arts (graduating in 2001). In 2000 he moved to Italy, attending the Florence Academy of Fine Arts (graduating in 2005). His artistic training has deep roots that branch from Armenia to Italy and converge in his artistic practice that is, and continues to be, constantly evolving. The presence of this connection is openly manifested in his works and is the result of the influence exerted by Armenian culture and his own landscape and the artistic training he then undertook in Italy. The artist has participated in numerous national and international exhibitions, such as the Venice Architecture Biennale (Armenia Pavilion) in 2010, the Venice Art Biennale (Collateral Event) in 2011, and in 2015 for the National Pavilion of Armenia, which won the Golden Lion in the same year.

In 2016 his work Diary was selected for the Frieze Sculpture Park 2016, and exhibited at Regent’s Park in London. Subsequently, the same work, after a long exhibition at the prestigious Yorkshire Sculpture Park in Britain, was selected for the permanent collection of the same park in 2021. In 2017, two works by Ohanjanyan were chosen for the Fiac - On Site project, exhibited in front of the Petit Palais in Paris. In 2018 the work The Threshold is the Source won the International Prize for Contemporary Art E. Marinelli for the Museo dell’Opera del Duomo in Florence. The work became part of the permanent collection of the Opera di Santa Maria del Fiore / Museo dell’Opera del Duomo in Florence. In 2021 Mikayel Ohanjanyan won the competition, announced by the CEI / Vatican, for the creation of liturgical-artistic works: the Altar, Ambone and Baptismal Font for the Don Giovanni Bosco Church in Bagheria, Sicily, to be completed in 2026. In 2022, in the context of the 9th edition of Stills of Peace and Everyday Life, Ohanjanyan was invited by the Aria Foundation (Pescara, Italy) to exhibit at the Roman Cisterns of the Ducal Palace of the Dukes of Acquaviva in Atri, Italy. In 2023, as part of White Carrara 2023 / Still Liv(f)e - The Forms of Sculpture, Ohanjanyan was invited by the city of Carrara to exhibit in the city’s public spaces.

Among the most important recognitions: Artist selected for Fiac - On Site, Petit Palais, Paris, France, 2017; Artist selected for exhibition at Yorkshire Sculpture Park, West Bretton, GB, 2017; Artist selected for Frieze Sculpture Park 2016, Regent’s Park, London, GB, 2016; Golden Lion - National Pavilion of Armenia 56th Venice Art Biennale, Venice, Italy, 2015; 1st Prize - Henraux Prize, Querceta, Italy, 2014; 1st Prize - Targetti Light Art Prize, Florence / Italy, 2009, 1st Prize - MOVIN’UP 2006, Italy, 2006; 1st Prize - II International Biennale of Contemporary Art of Pavia, Pavia, Italy, 2003; Diploma of Honor - XX Florence Prize, Italy, Florence, 2002; 3rd Prize - XIX Florence Prize, Florence, Italy, 2001; 3rd Prize - XIII International Sculpture Biennale of Ravenna, Ravenna, Italy, 1998.

In Milan, the observation of nature in the bipersonal exhibition of Linda Carrara and Mikayel Ohanjanyan

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