PORTRAIT

This project is about people staying in isolation. When people around the world abruptly was being locked at their home because of COVID-19 I was limited by watching people and decided to research facial expressions of people had violated the law. Arrested people who committed the crime had known that they could been caught. This unpleasant fact did left a mark on internal and external state of their personalities. And this was a purpose of my researching.

I decided to paint thirty portraits using only the black ink without pen or eraser. Because this project is about prohibitions.

You can indeed use the black ink only in one case - when you have nowhere to rush. I like using ink. It’s like a watercolour. But using ink you don’t get distracted by colours. And this allows you to show a person's character very clearly. The ink don’t forgive any mistakes as well. If your hand twitches the sheet will be thrown away. And one more, I painted using a sketchbook, so sheets couldn’t be torn out. The perfect conditions!

But the most important thing is a long time you need to wait, because you can’t use ink the second time before the first layer of ink have dried out (hairdryer is also prohibited as an eraser).

Well, do you need to be in rush when everybody is locked?

I used official pictures of people that just had been caught in the US, Indiana. I had the information about their real names, ages and dates they had been arrested. I wanted to know their fate because they couldn’t be judged without court sentence.

Now, have been getting through lockdown, I guess that think about imprisonment distorted their faces and appearance. We all have got through or are going through the forced restriction of freedom. This unexpected announcement about not being allowed to go out without any aftermaths or go to cafe, talk to your friends or relatives indeed scared everyone. Many people couldn’t get through this and got depressed while lockdown was going and after it as well.