The Antagonist Surrealist
A Surrealist who refused to be defined
“I always imagined that I would have a life very different than the one imagined for me,” she once said, “but I understood from a very early age that I would have to revolt in order to make that life.” - Leonor Fini
Someone once told me I was single because I’m impossible to pin down. I wasn’t sure if this was meant as an insult or not, like when people say you’re too picky or you’re too intimidating and unapproachable and you have no idea how to be approachable. No, what this person meant (who is a dear friend, I should add), was I had so many interests, hobbies, and talents, that no one ever knew what to expect from me, and that the men I was meeting were more confused than anything.
I can’t argue with them, because they’re completely right. I am difficult to pin down. Somehow, I never seem to fit into any box. The more someone knows me, the more they know they can’t define me (so I’m told). (but I definitely see it) Perhaps that’s why I felt so connected to Leonor Fini, today’s featured artist.
I cannot rightfully call Leonor Fini a painter because that’s too limiting and she wouldn’t like that. There have been some arguments that she wasn’t a Surrealist. She was involved with the Surrealists on a social level and did meet with Andre Breton who approved her work (in his own way I guess), but the idea of being pinned down to the Surrealists didn’t appeal to Fini and while she did exhibit with them for years, she refused to sign the Surrealist Manifesto. However, she still found great success and celebrity with the French art scene and the Surrealists.
And despite her immense talent and the incredible success she saw in her life, she's largely been cast aside and forgotten over the years. Not today. Not here. We’re starting to see a rise in Leonor Fine’s recognition, and I can only see that growing. So let’s talk about our favorite Surrealist-Not-Surrealist and Childless Cat Lady.
I will only be able to scratch the surface in my introduction today. I could spend a whole month writing about her and it still wouldn’t be enough, but I hope you see this as a starting point.
First, though, some housekeeping. The first thing I learned about Leonor Fini was that she was Argentine. I was delighted. A South American Female Artists??? I collect and study Latin American Literature in my free time, not for any reason other than because I want to know what my people have written. In my independent research, I’ve become obsessed with Victoria and Silvina Ocampo, Clarice Lispector, Gabriela Mistral, Idea Vilariño, and Maria Luisa Bombal to name a few. The thought that I could add Leonor Fini to that list is delightful.
Except.
Well.
Is she Latina?
I’ve heard a mix of things. Some say she has a mix of Spanish, Italian, Argentine, and Slavic ancestry. Some don’t say Argentine. To be fair, Clarice was born in Ukraine but ask any Brazilian and Clarice herself and everyone will agree she’s Brazilian to a tee. But Leonor Fini grew up in Italy, and from everything I’ve read and researched, it seems that’s how she defined herself: Italian. I’m more comfortable with the idea of her being Italian-Argentine, but I don’t want to mislead by saying she’s a woman of color or part of a minority. And that’s not even getting into the complicated history she had with her father. So, while I would love to consider her a Latina Artist, I’m going to play it safe and say Hispanic Artist. (if you’re not familiar with those definitions, I got you*)
I realize this debate I’m having with myself is ultimately the most Leonor Fini thing I could say. Of course, Leonor Fini can’t just be defined as a Latina Artist or an Italian Artist. That's just not her way. But let’s go into her troubling childhood.
Leonor Fini was born on August 30th 1907 in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Fini’s parents had a contemptuous relationship from the start. Her father was religious and abusive, often seeking to overpower her mother. When she was still a baby, her mother had enough and decided to flee Argentina for Italy. She was not granted a divorce for years, and throughout Leonor’s childhood, her father paid people to try and kidnap her. To protect her, Fini’s mother dressed her as a boy for six or seven years, which would go on to impact her work on gender identity through the years. Her life was surrounded by intelligent and creative women who would define much of her feelings on womanhood in general.
This need to dress as a boy, as well as the costuming she witnessed from her mother and friends, left an impression on Fini’s creative side. She began to take an interest in costuming and fashion, a passion that would continue into her life. In fact, the fashion world would converge with the art world through Leonor Fini.
But back to her youth, while in her early teens, Leonor Fini suffered an eye disease that forced her to wear bandages on both eyes. Imagine what this must have felt like to a budding creative. When the question of what sense you’d never want to lose comes up, it’s always sight for me (if you must know, I’d give up taste). But at the same time, one cannot help but wonder how she might have sunk into the sublime. We may not know what teenage Leonor Fini was thinking or witnessing in the darkness at that time, but we do know that once she healed and the bandages were off she was set on becoming an artist.
Much of her learning was self-taught. She didn’t attend school for the arts, but growing up in Italy gave her easy access to the styles of the Italian Mannerists and the Old Masters, and she studied their work to hone her craft. Soon, she would make her way to Paris, the center of the art world.
In the 1920s, as we know, Surrealism was taking the world by storm. Leonor Fini was introduced to Andre Breton to earn his approval and join the surrealist movement. Andre Breton told her to stop drawing on square paper but otherwise appeared to approve of her. However, she was not a fan of Breton’s authoritarianism nor did she approve of the manifesto (or manifestos in general). While her work hit on similar themes, she was something of an ‘antagonistic surrealist.’
To put into perspective why Andre Breton may have irked her the wrong way, in order to be part of the ‘in crowd,’ one needed Breton to approve. This meant members would be in and out. Andre Breton was something like the Anna Wintour of the Surrealists, dictating who was in and who wasn’t coming to the Met Gala. Magritte himself was kicked out.
The story goes that Magritte’s wife Georgette appeared at a Surrealist gathering wearing a cross necklace. Andre Breton demanded she take it off, and she laughed it off, explaining it was a gift from a relative who passed away and she didn’t wear it for religious reasons, but to recognize the relative. Breton, being the little bitch he was, didn’t care and demanded she take it off. Georgette, baffled that he was serious, walked out. Magritte joined, and they left France soon after (this was preplanned, but it does add to the drama). Magritte refused to associate with the Surrealists out of respect for his wife.
So this is the kind of thing Leonor Fini took issue with. That sounds ironic given she shows up at a Paris cafe dressed in the scarlet robes of a Catholic cardinal, stating she wanted to know how it felt to wear the clothes of a man who never knew a woman’s body. Similar to how Marisol years later would amaze people with her masked face at an artist’s event, this artistic act caused a sensation. So maybe she wasn’t besties with Breton, but she was already a hit.
Even so, she would rub shoulders with many surrealists and even enter into affairs with a few. If Leonor was making art, she was inspiring others to make art just by being herself. Dora Maar (yes we’ll talk about her this month) even took her portrait. She was vivacious, intelligent, and always wearing the most outrageous outfits. She could dress like a lion one second and go into heavy detail about Dante’s Inferno the next, and she would be insulted if you thought otherwise (she was Italian after all!).
Her first solo show came at the ripe age of 25 and was spearheaded by Christian Dior. Yes, that Christian Dior. Through her art and fashion connections, she would work and inspire another fashion icon, Elsa Schiaparelli. But let’s take a look at her art.
My introduction to Leonor Fini was this self-portrait with a Scorpion. And what an introduction. Not only is it an absorbing piece, but it throws us right into her oeuvre with its themes. Leonor Fini stares back at us, confident and defiant. I’ve spoken in the past of the power a self-portrait has when the woman stares back at us. Fini looks at us without any sense of self-consciousness. She will not lower herself for us.
Her clothes are torn, hinting at her sexuality as well as her rebellious nature. Who cares if her clothes are torn? She likes it, so she’ll wear it. The true indication of her sexuality, in fact, doesn’t come from her clothing, but her glove. It’s lifted slightly, a sly sexual gesture and a scorpion crawls out. My arachnophobia could never. The scorpion may seem dangerous, giving us a sense of her life on the edge as it is so close to her pulse, but it also represents lust. Yes, Leonor Fini is lustful and confident and she doesn’t care if that bothers you. What. A. Baddie.
Gender and Sexuality are a constant theme throughout her work, often explored through the Sphinx of mythology. But what I find most fascinating in this piece is her use of fashion. As stated above, costuming and dressing up were a huge part of her identity, but also shaped her views on gender identity. And she had Christian Dior and Elsa Schiaparelli at her fingertips. The fashion was just as important in her work as anything else.
As a lover of fashion history, I can tell you that paintings have shaped much of our understanding of the history of how we dress. But this comes in two forms, fashion plates used to advertise art pieces to potential customers, and fine art that showcases what nobility are wearing. The most famous example of this is, of course, Marie Antoinette (Nicole Miras is doing a whole series on her, by the way). She was famously painted in a dress that caused controversy for being compared to wearing underwear. However, an unfortunate (and dumb) aspect of history is that the moment women start doing it, it’s lame. Making art of fashion has often been considered ‘not high brow’ and given the way women dominate the fashion world, it’s often looked down upon by straight men. (I don’t mean this to undermine the men, both gay and straight, who have defined fashion history by the way)
Yet, Fini opposes that. Fashion is art in Fini’s world. And dammit we should all live in Fini’s world. She was known for her extravagant gowns worn while painting, and her name could be found all over Paris gossip columns discussing her many costumes. She was also known to cross-dress, though I suspect Fini didn’t always see it as cross-dressing so much as normal for her given her history. Her love of men’s fashion and women’s fashion led to her exploration of androgyny in her work.
“I am fascinated by the androgyne, for it seems to me to be the ideal. It unites the thinking aspect of the male with the imaginative side of the female. I would like to think of myself as androgynous.” - Leonor Fini (in an interview with Peter Webb)
So are we really surprised this incredible artist would end up collaborating with Elsa Schiaparelli? Uh no. Have you seen Schiaparelli’s designs? (don’t worry if you haven’t, I’ll cover that soon) Schiaparelli would use Leonor Fini’s celebrity to gain traction on her designs, employing her to model for her and wear her designs to events.
For the time period, Schiaparelli’s designs were unconventional. It didn’t help that she had a nemesis in the Paris fashion world who was none other than Coco Chanel (maybe you’ve heard of her?). So employing fellow Italian goddess Leonor Fini to help her promote her work seemed like a match made in heaven.
Leonor Fini designed Schiaparelli’s bottle for the perfume “Shocking.” The design is based on Mae West’s torso, which has been replicated again and again. It’s so incredibly feminine, and one can’t help but wonder how women must have perceived it. When I look at it, I’m reminded of the iconic statue from Fleabag, though it’s certainly much simpler. And yet, it couldn’t be more like Leonor Fini. Yes, it’s feminine, but there’s almost an androgynous shape to it, isn’t there? And it’s still sexy.
Leonor Fini would continue to wear Schiaparelli’s work throughout her life and even went on to design costumes for stage productions in the 1930s. Her work in costuming continued into the 70s, including Frederick Ashton’s Le Rêve de Leonor (“Leonor’s Dream”). The costumes featured animal-human hybrids, like something straight out of her paintings.
She even designed costumes for two films, Renato Castellani’s Romeo and Juliet in 1954 and John Huston’s A Walk with Love and Death in 1968. So we can see that fashion wasn’t just a way of expressing herself, it was her income. It was her life work just as much as painting. It was one of her great loves.
As for the feline motifs in her work and costumes, we can thank her incredible love for cats. When I say Leonor Fini loved cats, I don’t mean she thought cats were cute. Leonor Fini was not an ‘I like to watch cat videos’ kind of gal (like myself). She owned 23 cats. I can’t conceive of owning 23 dogs let alone cats.
Leonor Fini was even known for saying she turned her back on her religion (Catholicism) and only believed in The Cat Dog. She loved cats the way Egyptians did, which may explain the sphinx motifs in her work. When guests arrived at her home, they would find it surrounded by cats who would eat at the dinner table. And no one was to comment or complain about the cats, lest they face the wrath of their beloved mother.
Speaking of motherhood, Leonor Fini chose not to have children or settle down. She was an open bisexual, though was once noted as saying she ‘[did] not like women.’ While Fini did marry at one point and soon after divorced, she refused to be tied down and kept a decades-long polyamorous relationship with two male lovers.
"Marriage never appealed to me, I've never lived with one person. Since I was 18, I've always preferred to live in a sort of community – a big house with my atelier and cats and friends, one with a man who was rather a lover and another who was rather a friend. And it has always worked." - Leonor Fini
So we can see that the idea of the Childless Cat Lady a certain VP candidate detests is one of the few titles I think Leonor Fini would be okay with. If anything, I think she’d relish it. It didn't help that Leonor Fini also had a reputation for being ‘difficult.’ I’m not sure what to make of that comment, which I’ve seen now and then in studying up on her.
Her long-term polyamorous relationship started with her fascination with an Italian Count, Stanislao Lepri. He was a diplomat who quit his career to be with Fini and moved in with her. In the 1950s, Fini met the Polish writer Kot and they became lovers. He moved in with her and Lepri and they stayed together until their deaths. But the real chisme? Kot was the illegitimate half-brother of one of Fine’s favorite past lovers, Sforzino Sforza. You heard me. *Snap snap snap*
One can only imagine the kind of drama and fun Fini’s house was filled with, between 23 cats, endless art projects, and two men to keep entertained. I’m not surprised she had children with how busy her life was.
That brings me back to the themes of Leonor Fini’s art. Understanding her sexuality isn’t imperative in appreciating her art, but I do think it adds some layers to it. In Chthonian Deity Watching over the Sleep of a Young Man, we see a sphinx looking down at her lover. He is nude, covered by a small piece of pink fabric. There is a sense of foreboding in the piece.
What is the sphinx thinking? Is she unsatisfied with her lover? Is she demanding more of him? Perhaps she wants to be rid of him or wants to devour him (sexually or literally). The important part is that the sphinx is the one who controls his fate, not him.
By contrast, we have this painting.
Here we have a woman sitting on top of a man, staring out in thought. What is she contemplating? The man is asleep, unbothered by the woman who is sitting on him in a position that can't be comfortable. The image isn’t overtly sexual. They’re not having sex, but there is a power struggle here. She’s asserting herself, so nonplussed about the man that she can sit on him without a care in the world.
Playing with juxtaposition is a vital aspect of Surrealist art, and Fini does this here, but she’s using the juxtaposition of gender and gender norms. Dali did a lobster phone, Leonor Fini redefined gender roles and sexuality through her work.
In her self-portrait with Nico Papatakis (I’m assuming he was a lover since she painted him twice but I can’t find info anywhere confirming his or who he was), we see her looking down on her lover who is presented in an androgynous form. I’ve mentioned in the past that it’s always easier for artists to draw their gender, so it’s not strange for a man to paint a woman in a way that appears manly or vice versa. So in fact, Leonor Fini’s depiction of Nico here isn’t weird but it is intentional.
Is this meant to hint at Fini’s bisexuality? Or perhaps she is making a commentary on the woman as a muse and how she has been sexualized in history by treating a man in the same manner. Fini is not the first to do this, and I promise one day I’ll get into that because I’ve wanted to since starting on Substack, but her attempt to do this is iconic. It grips us andforces us to confront our views on gender and sexuality.
I don’t know for a fact what the Surrealist men thought of her work that dealt with these themes, but given that Andre Breton said in the second manifesto that they had to deal with the ‘problem of women,’ I can’t imagine they were fond of it. Yet what’s incredible about Leonor Fini’s work isn’t just that it challenged convention in its time, but it’s still challenging convention. She is still forcing us to ask questions, contemplate the female gaze, and see the fluidity present in sexuality.
I mentioned I was introduced to Leonor Fini through her self-portrait with a scorpion, but what sold me on her was when I looked her up one day and realized her work felt fresh and new as if they were painted yesterday. Sadly, Leonor Fini passed away in 1990, having lived a long adventurous life on her own terms.
Sphinx among mortals.
Fascinating. Thanks for the introduction.