Under the skin

Within the tradition of painting psychological themes as loneliness, fear, jealousy, passion and revenge are commonly used. In modern art Edward Munch was a painter who shows these existential conditions like Strindberg did in his plays. In the second half of the 20th century Francis Bacon is one of the artists who explicitly showed conditions of loneliness and fear in hallucinatory images. He uses photographic material and reproductions and transfers them in a dynamic and spontaneous way of painting. By mixing a rough and obsessive style with more soft transparent way of painting his works contain layers that can be compared with the dark layering’s of the human psyche. In a way Bacon ‘scans’ his subjects and by deforming the faces or the body he intensifies their mental state With his subjective approach he distances himself of the objectivity of a photo. The same distance is taken by Marlene Dumas when she uses photographic sources. Although a photo of a combination of different photos can be a source, she immediately releases the photo when she starts painting. Marlene Dumas uses photographic material that contain a relevance in our actual society, like images of terrorists, discrimination or pornography. By confronting the spectator with the recognizable image of a terrorist we are forced to consider if we still have an objective judgment. Are we looking to a criminal or is the blindfolded figure a victim? This ambiguity towards her portrayed models and the difficulty to judge without prejudices is a essential part of Dumas’ artistic approach. The investigation of the individual psyche is also an important element in the paintings of Kiki Lamers. As in the work of Dumas there is also fraction between the photographic person and the constructed image. There is always a kind of manipulation, like the reduction of all kinds of details. Sometimes she concentrates on specific elements of the face like the eyes of her portrayed model.They stare at us and it is if we are looking into the mind of the model, but at the same time we seem to be watched by the girl and we are put in the position of a voyeur.

All these examples of other painters are relevant for the work of Barbara de Vries. In her work, that actually does not contain of painting, but of digital reworked photographic material printed on Japanese paper, she combines and deforms her images in order to create her layered images. When she uses soft contours it brings in mind an aquarellist way of painting, a style De Vries used frequently before she started to use the computer as a tool in her photographic work. Her background as a stage designer has also influenced her actual work. This experience appears in the theatrical and dramatic setting and in the way she manipulates the light. In the photographic work there can be clear definition of space, but equally she uses an indistinct space that can vary from a sfumato-like space to a space where figures seem to float in. The figures are constructed out of several limbs and elements that are reconstructed in a new way, creating a new figuration. Sometimes a figure is standing alone against a wall and a feeling of isolation and desolation is raised. This psychological atmosphere in which her ‘actors’ perform is an essential element in her work. By the limited use of colour and concentration on black and white, many images can have a dramatic and somber tone. But when she creates images of free-floating figures in the air it can also create an atmosphere of freedom and euphoria. This ambivalence in moods reveals itself as well behind the facades of the portraits: it can vary from innocence to hateful angriness. It seems as it is De Vries’ capability to creep under the skin of a her model and analyzing the basic psycho logic characteristics. If she portrays a Spanish toreador it is not an arrogant hero, also a personality that embodied loneliness ad insecurity. These features and characteristics are never completely explicit, but leave the spectator enough openness to judge for himself. Also the costumes or the decorum reveal no strong clues: sometimes the figures seem to be derived from historic material and breaths a theatre-like character. It is as if De Vries is suggesting that it is irrelevant if we are watching a play of Beckett or of Kafka: in both cases we are challenged to personify ourselves with each character. She doesn’t hesitate to raise the most existential and dramatic themes. But the images stay suggestive and dream-like, they never pretend to have final answers. As spectator we are left with images and we are forced to dig in our memory and recall experiences to reconstruct new meanings and contents.     

by Maarten Bertheux independant curator in amsterdam