Work statement
The appeal of Dracula is decidedly ambiguous. The emphatic white tie and black cape, so striking at first glance, rapidly yield endless shades of gray.
Most monsters take and trample. Dracula alone seduces, courting before he kills.
Unlike other monsters he is not recognized as such.
Dracula looks too much like one of us. With patent leather shoes and patent leather hair , he mocks our concepts of civility and society , uses them as a brazen camouflage, the better he stalks us , his readers, his film audiences, his prey.
David J. Skall from the book Hollywood Gothic
These words I coiincedentally read in a book reminded me of the paintings of Sophia Janatti .
There is an ambiguity in her work , men and women blend together as one hermaphroditic creature , or ghost , much like the dracula figure.
Also the figures in her paintings aren`t much to anything but messing around , wasting time ,
kissing , lamentating .
This has a strong attraction to me as a viewer , there are no rules , there is no time schedule ,
we can float around in space with these characters as long as we want to .
It is as the painting is asking us to make love with them , to join them in their useless but
seducing activities .
Just like the nature or the stars which always stay in the background ,
let others save the planet , worry about the future , we are parefectly happy in our sweet little limbo .
Janatti laughs at the world , and all the world gives back is a faint smile filled with cruelty .
Perhaps that is the tragic beauty of Sophia`s paintings .
Her inner world is out of sync with the outside , like many of us already experienced .
We are filled with love , yet outside there is only porn .
Janatti explores the boundaries of those two worlds , just like her figures are a mix of two ,
Relationships begin and end , who is who , are you me or am I you ,
I can hear her characters ask theirselves over and over again ,
Are you thinking what I`m thinking , or am I thinking what you are thinking ?
endless confusion , but yet consoled in their own faith .
Where does reality and fantasy lie , and who decides what is true and what is not ?
Sidyon Cucaro
Amsterdam 2010