ART BEAT n° 2 – Robyan Talk about Nicoletta Ceccoli

Hi all, in the second episode of ART BEAT i decided to talk about an illustrator very interesting: Nicoletta Ceccoli.

Born in 1973 in the Republic of San Marino, where she lives and works, Nicoletta Ceccoli graduated from the Urbino State Art Institute in the animation film section. However, she dedicates herself to illustrating childhood books, becoming famous when she moves the subject of her illustrations, representing enigmatic little girls with ethereal features, with an extremely delicate and meticulous pictorial technique. From that moment she becomes an artist loved all over the world.

She also has published more than twenty works for major Italian publishing houses (Mondadori, Fabbri, Arka, Fatatrac, San Paolo) and for some foreigners in England, Taiwan and Switzerland. Her books have been translated in France, Korea, Mexico, Spain and the United States.

In the 2001 she was awarded at the Andersen-Bay of fairy tales Award as best illustrator of the year, while in 2002 her illustrations for Pinocchio published by Mondadori received the “Award of excellence” from Communication Art (USA). She did many exhibitions in Italy and abroad (Osaka, Tokyo and Bratislava). For the Republic of San Marino she did also three series of postage stamps dedicated to children’s rights, Christmas and circus. The series dedicated to Christmas received the  Cavallino d’oro Bolaffi  award as the author of the best sketch of 2001.

I love her illustrations because they are cute and scary at the same time. Her little girls are candidly disturbing, realism and surrealism: are mixed up in an enchanted and terrible univers.

The sweet creatures of Nicoletta Ceccoli are fragile and icy: Sirens, strong little landladies, insect women, amazons armed with hood and sword: ethereal and terrifying figures in a sort of fantastic parallel world in which the dawn lights soon revealed the deceit. A place full of surrealistic suggestions, where these dolls from porcelain skin are moving, far from being fragile and innocent.