Leoni, a citizen of the world since 1976, a visual artist, since he was a child he was able to live with different cultures, this accumulation of experiences allowed him to channel his art based on the balance of the ancestral knowledge of the peoples and the wisdom of nature.
He was born and raised between the highlands and the valleys of La Paz, Bolivia, close to the Andean and Afro-descendant cultures, he studied Plastic Arts at the Universidad Mayor de San Andrés. His work has gone through several cycles, after academy for a few years he became passionate about the world of biology and dedicated his art to insects, birds and mammals, as well as applying art to projects with protected areas in the Amazon. and the Bolivian Pantanal, a region where indigenous peoples still live: Guarani, Mojeños, Chiquitanos, and Ayoreos.
He left his country looking for a new beginning in his personal and professional life. During that period, it was realistic still lifes that tempered his patience and technique. After living for a few years in Costa Rica and Uruguay, he returned to the south of Bolivia, on the border with Argentina, to begin a new phase of his life and career, where guided by energy, he toured and developed artistic projects with his family in the Salar. of Uyuni, Samaipata and the Jesuit Missions.
He currently lives and works in the capital of São Paulo, in this constant walk that he calls his Peabirú (sacred path for some indigenous peoples) there is also an inner search that leads him to explore available materials, tools and techniques, giving him the freedom to create, passing from the figurative to the abstract and from the academic to the experimental.
Each of his series is the reflection of his experiential research, always seeking balance and the relationship between the energy of nature, the traditions of the peoples and contemporary society, creating channels of provocation that affect the importance of both individual and individual identity. as collective.
Painting is his main means of expression, but he also interacts with other areas such as music, dance, theater, video, digital art and even augmented reality, this is how his work results in collaborative productions that are presented both in the context of an exhibition, performance or installation.
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Considering art as a lifestyle, in his 20-year career he has had more than 50 individual and collective exhibitions in Bolivia, Costa Rica, Uruguay, Brazil, Chile, Peru and Mozambique. He received recognition for his pictorial merit, his contribution to environmental education, and his artistic drive for the rescue, appreciation, and dissemination of indigenous Latin American cultures through his art.
His work is found in the book "Contemporary Art of Bolivia" (Ed. 2020). On the other hand, he was the creative and coordinator in the design and execution of interpretation centers, living museums, stands and interactive panels for WWF, International Conservation, Noel Kempff Museum, COBIMI, FAN, PRAEDAC, CABI, BOLFORT in more than 8 protected areas of Bolivia.