Female Portrait 1958

Hryhorii Havrylenko made this watercolor portrait of a woman, sometime in the middle of the last century, we think. It’s a simple composition, but the way he builds up the colors, layer upon layer, gives it a haunting, almost dreamlike quality. Look at the way he uses these cool blues and pinks, not just for the sky, but also to describe her face and dress. He's not trying to trick the eye, instead he wants you to see that a face, like the sky, is also just made of color. The paint is applied thinly, like a stain, allowing the paper’s texture to come through. Notice the sketchy lines that give the portrait structure, especially around the eyes and mouth. They’re not precise, but they add to the emotional weight of the piece, like a half-remembered memory. It reminds me a little of Alex Katz, in his flattened planes and everyday subject matter, but with a rawness that is all its own. It’s not about perfection, it's about exploring how we see and feel, in a world that is always shifting and changing.