Fini reveals an unexpected side to her work in paintings in which she experiments with the application and materiality of paint. Here, she moves away not only from the precise brushstrokes of her ‘Old Master’ style, but also from clearly defined forms.

Leonor Fini’s ‘The Scarlet Earth’ oscillates between abstraction and concrete pictorial elements. The rich reds and purples evoke a scene from the underworld, possibly the subsoil or a cross-section through layers of sediment. Here and there, one can make out what appear to be worms or crawling creatures. Indistinct outlines of plant-like forms appear along the upper edge of the painting. Are they plants or nature spirits? Fini leaves the motifs too undefined for us to identify them with certainty. She moves even further towards abstraction in ‘Evening Chimera’ which, with its restless red patches against a dark blue background, depicts forms that resist classification, instead resembling a Rorschach test. As viewers, we are left to assign meanings to these forms. For Fini herself, the focus here was undoubtedly on experimenting with the application of paint and its layers. Through her interactions with the Surrealist art scene and her friendship with Max Ernst, she was familiar with techniques such as decalcomania and grattage and employed them herself.

Female figures beyond desire and idealisation: Leonor Fini imbues them with a dark power and gloom. In her works, death appears not as something to be feared but as a powerful ally.

An elegant ‘Angel of Anatomy’ confronts us with a deliberate gaze: a slender figure stripped of its skin, whose red flesh and pale bones stand out vividly against the dark background.
The anatomy of the human body held a great fascination for Fini. Even as a young girl, she would visit the mortuary in Trieste and watch the dead being dissected, as can be seen in the painting ‘The Angel of Anatomy’. At the same time, the work’s dark colours and undefined background place it within the ‘Old Master’ painting tradition, as does the dramatic composition with the draped cloak and outstretched wings. It is reminiscent of Caravaggio’s Baroque paintings with their stark chiaroscuro, or of scenes of martyrdom, such as that of Saint Bartholomew being flayed.
Many of Fini’s works reflect the artist’s preference for dark and abyssal themes. Yet the androgynous skeletal figure could also be another self-portrait by Fini. The face appears young and timeless, while its theatrical pose is consistent with her other self-stagings.

The paintings ‘Sphinx Regina’ and ‘The Thinker’ are both imbued with a morbid and mysterious quality. The former depicts one of Fini’s numerous sphinxes disappearing into a dark landscape. It remains unclear whether the eerie surroundings are characterised by death and decay, or whether it is an enchanted forest. The titular winged figure is a descendant of pensive Melancholy, a popular subject in ‘Old Master’ paintings of the late Renaissance. Leonor Fini also follows in the tradition of Dark Romanticism, which evoked sombre, mysterious, and enigmatic narratives in atmospheric scenes.

The SCHIRN is dedicating the first major exhibition in Germany to Leonor Fini, offering a comprehensive overview of this artist’s fascinating body of work. Drawing on the Renaissance, Symbolism, Dark Romanticism and the tradition of ‘Old Master’ painting, Fini developed a visual language all her own – full of dreams, myth and fantasy. She created female figures that defied traditional gender roles: not passive, but self-assured beings who observe, make decisions, and command the space around them. Fini thus presents a kind of counterworld to the familiar gender stereotypes of Surrealism, in which women were often portrayed as muses or reduced to the role of the femme fatale.
Leonor Fini’s art, together with her penchant for self-fashioning and refusal to submit to social norms, has left a rich legacy in Western popular culture. Fashion designers, in particular, have been inspired by her fantastical visual worlds. The exhibition invites you to immerse yourself in her extraordinary world.

Fini was not only a passionate cat lover; at times, she had as many as fifteen cats. They brought her comfort and were even allowed to sleep in her bed. Be sure not to miss the painting ‘Sunday Afternoon’ in the exhibition.