Double Self-Portrait 1985

Curator: Ilka Gedo’s "Double Self-Portrait," created in 1985, presents a fascinating case study in artistic representation. It's rendered using a mixed-media approach, including painting and impasto techniques. Editor: It hits you immediately, doesn't it? A real sense of anxious energy conveyed through these agitated lines and that raw texture. There's a rawness to the surface, a palpable layering of the materials, creating real depth but also a frenetic unease. Curator: Yes, the dynamism is achieved through a combination of color and form. Observe how the composition pushes our eye through a triangular scaffolding from left to right; the warm, earthy hues in the first self-portrait anchor the piece. From there, we pivot to a cooler, almost mournful rendering of a face to its right. Editor: But this isn't just about formal aesthetics, is it? For me, the appeal is about understanding what's behind these portraits. What was her studio practice? The textures seem like a battle to arrive to the essence of something elusive. You know, she reused surfaces and supports constantly… almost an urgency to create over what already exists. Curator: Precisely! Consider how this impasto, layering process obscures some features, highlighting others. Gedo seems to be actively engaged in concealing and revealing herself. The artist presents us with multiple, conflicting images in a simultaneous fashion. Note too the almost surreal effect that these abstract shapes offer the overall portrait. Editor: Definitely! Gedo was part of a community making art outside the official circuit in socialist Hungary, working from alternative spaces. This piece and its materials tell us something about her resourcefulness but it also embodies the defiant creative spirit of her contemporaries working against oppressive state regulations. The "self" is created and recreated through resistance to a lack of proper supplies, working with available resources. Curator: And the resulting image offers viewers a window into the fragmentation of identity itself. As a formal exercise, "Double Self-Portrait" creates tension. The artist uses both pictorial devices and a clear material strategy to ask deep questions of the self. Editor: A brilliant point. And from a materialist perspective, it speaks to how identity is crafted from a complex matrix of available, often inadequate resources and resilient intention. It is the act of its making.