About

 

The work, made of plasticine, relates to the painting ‘The Lady in Yellow’ by Max Kurzweil (1900), turning the painting into a small three-dimensional sculpture, with tragi-comic elements. In a quick glance, the work seems light-hearted, with a whimsical and decorative air, like the little ceramic sculptures depicting idyllic scenes that adorned the salons of Europe from the 17th till the beginning of the previous century. This ‘salon-like’ impression is undermined when it becomes clear that the sculpture is made of plasticine – a highly unstable material – and also when the yellow wolf behind the back of the lady is discovered. The yellow wolf is also laden with symbolic allusions: Vienna’s period of flourishing, at the start of the 20th century – as represented by the Lady – was short. That was the Europe from before the First World War. The wolves were breathing at the neck… I chose not to make the wolf overtly threatening, he sits comfortably on the couch, almost like a pet – that questionably guards the lady, questionably threatens her, and perhaps has already devoured her.