Subsequent works are all built around the repeated gesture of covering my body in wax. At the same time, I refer to the tradition of religious ex-voto: make a symbolic sacrifice in order to become beautiful. A votive figure is an offering placed within places of worship to vow, gain favour or give thanks. It often takes the form of modeled reproduction of ill body part or organ, which reffers to a particular issue – failing eyesight, fertility, arthritic limbs.*
Created figures are not made only from the wax. My body stays inside a wax shell and I myself become a votive figure. The color on the wax is not outer decorative in itself, it is driven by the beauty products used to decorate the body. The trace of lipstick, shining through the waxen layer, marks the point of contact between the living body and the shell.
The cult of the real body, in a paradoxical twist, spreads best through virtual reality in social media. For many, the depiction of appealing, desirable body becomes the only pursuit, a way of life, a stepping stone to a life of fame and fortune. The body and its beauty have become commodities that can be monetized to an unprecedented extent.
In order to respond to this reality, I use an aesthetic derived from a visual code characteristic of the modern cosmetics industry. The initial works focus on a detailed study of the wax-covered body. Everything seems soft, rounded, pleasant, wax reminds one of sugar frosting. Meanwhile the process itself is neither pleasant nor pretty. It has little to do with the surface of the image. Wax burns, gets into your nose, makes your lashes fall out and makes your hair stick together.
In my latest works I take this wax figure, this victim, into perfect spaces – retro-futuristic interiors or microworlds enveloped in pink plush upholstery, with beautiful mirrors and curtains, representations of our aspirational lifestyle, all colourful and fancy. And yet absolute alienation and loneliness ensues. The anxiety comes in crevices, cracks, scars.
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* Wax has the unique ability to simulate the look, touch, and feel of human flesh. From earliest times, artists and artisans have used these qualities to create realistic reproductions of the human body as objects for devotion, memorial, scientific research, and entertainment.