Art grounds me in life. It gives me goals and a purpose. My Art practice is inherent to my evolution as a person making her way thru life on this planet.

–  Jyl Bonaguro 

PC: Motion Filmworks (@motionfilmworks)

What introduced you to the world of Art, and why you chose to stay with it?

I have always been inspired to create Art from a very young age. My greatest happiness comes from creating Art and that is why I stay with it.

You specialize in carving Italian marble by hand. Its a very beautiful and exquisite art-form, how did you find your creativity in this?

I find creativity in everything but Italian marble, in particular statuario, has special qualities. No other stone can create the exquisite detail and ethereal sheen of statuario marble. The carved sculptures have a sense of vitality. When I’m carving, I feel like I just borrowed a piece of the earth temporarily to shape it and then someday, it will just get returned.

The concept of your ‘Wings Series’ is laid out on ‘Change’ which is the only constant in our lives. Through this series, you have tried to dig deeper into ‘Realizations’, ‘Immortality’, ‘Human conditions’. Is there more to it? 

Stone carving is one of the earliest forms of Art. There must be something deeply appealing about hitting a stone and shaping it into art and architecture. Ever enduring stone outlasts most other forms of Art and so it feels purposeful and permanent in an ever changing world. Enjoying the moment of life and embracing the change and lack of permanence can bring fulfillment. It’s all very transitory but we can leave things behind, tracings of our lives. I happen to be scattering some carved stone into temporal immortality.

PC: Rod Pickett Photography (@rod.pickett.photography)

Tell us more about your Figurative Marble Sculptures and Drawings…

All my sculpture begins with my drawings and figurative works. The human form is one of my greatest challenges and I constantly train and practice the drawing and sculpting of it.

PC: Simon Rubinstein (@refracted.reality)

You have been a part of numerous Art exhibitions, public events and installations. How easy or difficult it is for an artist to judge one’s own Art objectively? 

I believe it to be impossible to be completely objective about one’s own Art. However, discussing and explaining your work is important and necessary and through those discussions with other people some objectivity can be achieved for you.  

Besides being an Artist, you are also a Playwright. How liberating is this shift from one creative form to another?

It is deeply liberating to shift between mediums. Sculptures are silent figures in space. They can only express in part all of the thoughts that course through me. This remains an issue even when I create multi-media installations, so much remains interpretive. However, the medium of a play allows for all the dialogue that cannot be captured in a short artist statement. I can say anything and everything in a play.

Would you like to share about ‘Lifted’, the film documentary by Motion Filmworks on your experiences in Italy?

Everything Dorian and Maggie Iribarren create becomes fine art filming in their hands and my greatest concern was that I wouldn’t be ready for their arrival in Pietrasanta. I put in 12 to 14 hour days prior to their arrival so that they could film the wing in a finished state.  Since it was the very first wing in the wings series, it has a special place in my life. It marks a turning point in my carving.

PC: Motion Filmworks (@motionfilmworks)

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P.S. The featured image is by Simon Rubinstein (@refracted.reality)

(Exclusive for Real Life Heroes – By Manvi)