Portrait of A.K 1998

Curator: Here we have Panayiotis Tetsis’ "Portrait of A.K." from 1998. It's painted with oil paints, depicting a seated figure. My immediate feeling is a kind of weary composure. He looks… present. Editor: Present and yet… the making of this! Look at those strokes, the thick application. There’s no hiding here. It's very exposed labour, wouldn’t you say? Curator: I suppose so. But it’s also something about how Tetsis captures a mood. It's interesting that we don’t get much sense of context for A.K. There’s no explicit story, but this image is potent and I can invent whatever story I choose to believe. Editor: What catches my eye is the pure materiality. The choice of oil paint, the clear visibility of each brushstroke. Look at the casual ease with which Tetsis deploys that impasto technique to make form. Do you imagine he laboured on preliminary sketches, or jumped right in? Curator: Tetsis' use of bold color, it gives such energy. I see a contrast between the vibrant blue jeans, for example, and that somewhat fatigued expression. To me it’s like a distillation of quiet moments, something universal about the human condition in repose, maybe even boredom, I sense he has just flopped down and taken his seat. Editor: I think this portrait really pushes us to think about production as an experience. It’s one that invites us to slow down, to really consider the human effort required to bring something like this into being. Consider, even the conditions of A.K.’s work that enables this artistic creation. Is there exploitation built into this portrait? Curator: Oh, I think it's an observation! It brings us close to a shared, if fleeting, sense of existence. Thank you, Tetsis! Thank you A.K. Editor: Right, so materiality meets social context, and here we all are to examine how those things meet and what labour this image reveals. Thank you both!