Biography • Expositions • Critical Text

Isabella Tirelli was born in the countryside near Reggio Emilia. The sculptor and painter Marino Mazzacurati, a family friend, instilled in her a passion for Art. At sixteen to pay for her studies at the Liceo Artistico she starts woking as a model and in a few months she ends up in the pages of Vogue. In Milan she studies “off the records” at Accademia and officially Architecture.

	She feels the urgency to know Rome and the artists animating its art scene: she leaves fashion and Milan for Rome. Here, she becomes acquainted with the painters Giulio Turcato, Mario Schifano and the sculptor Eliseo Mattiacci.
Vogue Italia

Her artistic curiosity prompts her to experience other forms of expression such as drama: she works  with the director Giuliano Vasilicò (Proust).
	Polaroid di Mario Schifano a Isabella, 1989

Isabella con Giulio Turcato foto Stefany Ousler	"Proust", 1979 – Regia di G.Vasilicò

	The birth of her son Stefano brings her back to painting and she begins to exhibit her works.
... con mio figlio Stefano

Carmen, 1990	Principe Fuoco, 2000

From 1985 she paints and participates in a number of exhibition in Italy and in Europe (Art’, Basel; Arco, Madrid; Forum, Hamburg). She investigates the technique  of collages. Back to the theatre, she is scene-designer for The Traditional Puppet Theatre of Otello Sarzi (Pinocchio and Pierino e il Lupo), but also actress and assistant director. Together with the poet Corrado Costa she realizes “four hands” books and for the theatre Statebradi performed at the Festival of Polverigi, in Milan, Rome and in Paris at the Beaubourg. In 1985 she is back to Fashion as director and performance planner.

Foto di scena "Statebradi" al Beaubourg di Parigi, 1984.

Spettacolo Wella, 1985	L'Oreal, 1989

In 1987 she realizes a performance outside the Chrisler Building.
In 1989 she produces pictorial images for the Nuclear Physics Institute of Gran Sasso (INFN)

	In 1990 she meets computer art, working as an art director in Milan for Exprimo (videoclip for Fabrizio De Andre’ and others).
Foto da videoclip per "Exprimo", 1990

She is now conjugating painting, poetry, music and virtual technologies that will converge in the exhibition Cenerentola (Cinderella) held in Bologna in the same year.

Matrigna, 1989	Pentole, 1990

From 1991 to 1996 she develops the gender “portrait” in painting, analyzing the relation between Easthetics and Power with the series “Nobildonne e lor Signori” “Gente di Lusso”.
	Gloria del Castello di Belgioioso 1993, olio su tela, cm.100 x 80

She collaborates with Fabio Sargentini to various  performances for the theatre and exhibitions (Ritorno al Mare in Polignano a Mare, Exhibition at The Modern Art Gallery in Valencia). Together they realize for the publisher Vanni Scheiviller the book “Diario per modo di dire”.

Fabio Sargentini e Isabella Tirelli	"Gli Italiani contro la piovra", 1995 Polignano a Mare

Interactive Alife Dance Performance, 50 min. Theatre of Palais of San Vincent, March 2001	Sensitive Painting, IVO Dart, S.O.A.S, Londra, 2002