For the series Diva, Baptiste Leonne has developed an original artistic approach based on mirror reflections and combining painting and photography, thus blurring the boundaries between reality and fiction. His models pose in front of a mirror and he paints on the reflected images. The mirror is absorbed in the work and becomes both image and subject. Each work is a new interpretation which brings to light an intimate, secret and sacred scene, hidden in the shadows.
His work portrays with magical elegance different women, dressed under the painting strokes and sublimated in the mirror reflection. Each portrait seems like a nostalgic illusion of a woman, depicted in a unique way through games of colors and reflections and sharing a common reminiscence of women beauty.
Leonne's works echo notions of femininity and identity. The act of looking in the mirror is strongly associated with women, especially historically. Indeed, Leonne highlights femininity and feminism as a distinct motif in his works. Using his brush and camera lens, he successfully captures the feminine beauty in all its intensity, turning his models into universal characters.
In his view, his works reflect an attempt to bring back to the cynical world all the poetry that emanates from the souls of women. The play of light and shades in each work is reminiscent of a nostalgic aesthetic from another time. Ancient goddesses and mythological statues such as the Venus de Milo statue are a source of inspiration for him, representing eternal feminine power and at the same time symbolizing the beauty of imperfection.
Leonne invites us to examine his various "Diva" as a collective, an imaginary tribe of women who transcend space and time. They seem to be in a similar yet different world – just within our reach. The reflection motif presented throughout the works glances back at us, evoking not only our own self-image but the way others see us.
