Self-Portrait | Jane Ladan | Lee Matasi Gallery

 

Untitled

 

SELF-PORTRAIT
JANE LADAN
MARCH 14th – 27th, 2013
Vernissage, Thursday March 21st, 5:30 – 8:00
Lee Matasi Gallery
35 George St Ottawa, ON
(613) 241-7471

Artist Statement

Recently, I prepared for interviews which required me to explore my personality and motivations with art. It forced me to look inside my own spirit which further exposed me to my personality traits, my strengths and my weaknesses. In turn, this self-enquiry led me to focus this work on myself. Hence I called it ‘Self-Portrait’.  My drawings are about how I describe myself in the private. This entails when I am alone at home or with my children, acting as a caring and protecting mother. On the other hand, I am also an emotional human being with some elements of my personality being somewhat explosive and unpredictable, resulting in positive and sometime more negative emotions.  But in the public, I am fairly reserved and discrete.


I have based my whole work on the concept of an onion, comprised of several layers, depicting both traits and sheets of protection and inner self. In this set of 2D paper drawings, I have worked on a white background, adding different types of layers to create volume while using the same paper for background and perspective. There is a lot of white background in my work – representing emptiness – which is stimulated by the sharp lines and fibres which I have used to depict personality traits. Also, I have used black to show sharp edges, thick black pieces for my more mature/motherly side and orange to highlight the positive and powerful emotions which I can easily access but rarely share in the public. This group of work can be seen from a fairly close distance, yet little secrets and more specific personality traits are being revealed as the viewer’s attention goes onto the detail of the work by coming much closer to the pieces.