Anna Rutkowska (b. 1996), Image to turn, 2021

Yolk tempera, canvas (linen), 50 x 60 cm, signed on the back

Anna Rutkowska, born 1996 in Warsaw, graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw in 2020, winning the Coming Out award for Best Diploma (under the direction of Prof. Jaroslaw Modzelewski). Finalist in Hestia's Artistic Journey competition in 2020. Painter, performer, creator of installations.

The artist seeks new matter for her paintings. The forms, abstract at first glance, are surprisingly consistent in their subject matter - "not everything is connected to everything, but everything is connected to something," in the words of Donna Haraway. Spermaceti, a semi-liquid substance from the head of a spermaceti, was used to make candles and creams and lubricant for industrial and agricultural machinery, which in turn resemble torture tools and erotic toys. The artist's body tells a story of tenderness and violence against many other bodies. The artist looks at the elements of reality on a micro scale, in close approximation, and looks for a place for women's bodies in it, and investigates power relations in reality. (text by Bogna Stefanska)