Description
An erect female figure, seen from behind, accompanied by a white bird —a symbol of vision, freedom, and ancestral knowledge. The robe surrounding her is not woven: it is roots that become branches, a vegetal cloak that transforms her into a hybrid creature. The dark roots enveloping her lower body transform into branches that rise upward, as if the figure were simultaneously rooted in the earth and growing toward the sky.
Potnia Theròn Noctua recalls the ancient Mistress of the Animals in her most archaic dimension: that of guardian of the link between the animal and plant worlds, mediator between the underground and the celestial vault. The title Noctua evokes night vision, the ability to see in the darkness what escapes the light of day.
Federica Barcellona constructs the image through photography, graphic manipulation, and artificial intelligence, superimposing the human body and organic matter to create a contemporary iconography of the sacred feminine.
The boundary between the human and plant bodies dissolves: the transformation is already underway. The Potnia is tree-woman, root and branch, earth and air, a vertical element connecting the worlds. The white bird on her raised arm completes the triad: roots that sink, trunk that supports, wings that fly.
Potnia Theròn Noctua is a portrait of female power, both rooted and free, an icon of perpetual metamorphosis that inhabits the border between the vegetal and animal kingdoms, between root and flight.
