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until 31.07. | #5108ARTatBerlin | Luisa Catucci Contemporary shows from Saturday, 27. June 2026 (Opening: 26.06.) the exhibition Between breaths – il mio canto libero by the artist Luisella Traversi Guerra.
The first reaction is physical.
A deep breath.
That breath which comes instinctively when faced with an open landscape, in the presence of something alive – something that clears the lungs whilst simultaneously touching something less tangible. The chest expands, the rhythm slows, perception sharpens.
Luisella Traversi Guerra’s work begins precisely there.
It does not demand to be read. It demands to be breathed.
Her painting does not construct images. It allows them to emerge. It does not describe the world, but enters into it and dissolves the distance between the viewer and the phenomenon. What appears on the canvas is never static: a field in motion, in which colour, matter and gesture remain in constant transformation.
Nature is not a subject here. It is a state.
Blossoms, twigs and fields in full bloom are not depicted as such. They expand, dissolve and reform until they become something else: vibration, density, rhythm. The visible is merely the first layer. What opens up behind it goes beyond recognition.
The exhibition unfolds across the four rooms of Luisa Catucci Contemporary in Berlin, with each room corresponding to a season. Not as a representation, but as an experience. Each room is further brought to life by essential oils and ikebana arrangements created by the artist herself. In this way, the work extends into the sensory realm and deepens its dialogue with the cycle of the seasons.
Spring is the inhalation. A moment of opening. The forms are still uncertain, emerging, hovering between manifestation and dissolution. Everything is possible; nothing is yet fixed.
Summer is the full breath. Expansion, saturation, immersion. The pictorial space becomes dense, almost overwhelming. The colour intensifies, the material thickens; the body is drawn in and absorbed.
Autumn is the slowing of the breath. A return to the inner self. Layers settle, the tones deepen, the gestures become more deliberate. What remains is not less, but more concentrated. The work begins to slow down time.
Winter is the held breath. A moment of suspension. The image becomes essential, reduced and yet charged. Silence appears, yet it is not empty. It is precise. It is silence.
Through all these transitions, the work is underpinned by a meditative and steadfast discipline. Not visible as control, but as devotion. A constant return to the same inner necessity, approached each time from a different angle, until something begins to resonate with clarity.
Over time, the painting has moved away from the need to define form. What remains is matter as language. Pigment condenses or dissolves, surfaces open or close; colour becomes more rhythm than description.
Viewers do not stand opposite the work, but find themselves within it. The work reveals itself not as an object, but as a space. It demands time, attention and presence. It changes depending on how one moves through it.
What emerges is not an image, but a state.
A state in which breathing and seeing begin to align. In which perception becomes not only visual, but physical. In which painting becomes something that is not merely viewed, but experienced.
Between Breaths – il mio canto libero is not an exhibition about the seasons.
It is an exhibition about cycles of expansion and return, about the movement between opening up and pausing, between immersion and clarity.
About that moment between one breath and the next, when the inside and the outside coincide for an instant.
Luisa Catucci
Gallery Director & Curator
Opening: Friday, 26. June 2026, at 6 pm
Exhibition dates: Saturday, 27. June until Friday, 31. July 2026
To the gallery
Bildunterschrift Titel: Courtesy of Luisa Catucci Contemporary
Exhibition Luisella Traversi Guerra – Luisa Catucci Contemporary | Zeitgenössische Kunst Berlin – Contemporary Art – Exhibitions Berlin Galleries | ART at Berlin
