Caterina Leone

Caterina Leone is a Melbourne-based artist revitalising the historic drawing technique of silverpoint to create intimate self-portraits that question societal notions of gender. She inserts herself into the religious, mythological and art historical iconographies that have fascinated her since childhood, and which, due to her biological sex, hold conflicting connotations of exclusion and reverence. By recreating this imagery in her own image, in disregard of sex and the gender binary, she removes the barriers to her inclusion. In doing so, the artist is able to explore her identity and how it has been shaped by patriarchal, societal ideas of femininity. Her combination of silverpoint - a largely forgotten, pre-graphite way of drawing with precious metals such as silver - with contemporary mediums like spray paint, is a means of exploring this inner conflict in her choice of materials as well as subject matter.    Born in Sydney, she studied at the National Art School and worked in arts administration, writing and curating before moving to Melbourne in 2017 to pursue her own art practice. Caterina’s interest in art began in childhood, inspired by her artist and designer grandfather, whose artistic ability helped him survive POW camps in Germany during WWII and who studied under Communist rule in Ukraine. Consequently her conception of art is defined by a belief that it must attempt to transform, redeem and challenge the self and society.   Her work has been featured in online and print publications, most recently in Synaesthesia Magazine in April 2018. She was the guest editor of The Journal of Australian Ceramics for the July 2014 edition, and she continues to have articles and reviews published in a range of newspapers and magazines. Caterina has been included in numerous group exhibitions and juried art shows in both NSW and Victoria, with a solo exhibition in January 2018 followed in September by inclusion in The Way We See Ourselves, a group exhibition at West End Art Space that was selected for the 2018 Melbourne Fringe Festival. A solo exhibition at Rubicon ARI in June 2019 was followed by group show Salon, alongside Lily Mae Martin at Scott Livesey Gallery. In January 2020, she was invited to exhibit in Antipodes 2020 at BeinArt Gallery, which was covered by The Age. She was featured in All She Makes magazine in 2021.In December 2019, Caterina undertook a month-long residency in Finland. The work begun at this residency was shown at Tinning St Presents in May 2021 and in 2022 she was a finalist in the prestigious M16 Drawing Prize.