Self Portrait 1993

Here, Dmitri Zhilinsky portrays himself in a self-portrait with oil on canvas. The inclusion of a rooster immediately draws our attention. This symbol, deeply entrenched in cultural memory, has crowed across diverse epochs. The rooster has been featured as a symbol of vigilance and resurrection since antiquity. Think of its resonance in the tales of Aesop or its place atop church steeples as a weather vane. The rooster stands alongside the artist in a visual dialogue—a conversation with the self. The piercing gaze of the artist and the sharp comb of the rooster create a visual rhyme that resonates with the symbolism of awareness and the cyclical nature of life. It is a motif that continuously resurfaces, each time shaded with new meaning, a testament to the enduring power of images in our collective psyche.