«Russia or Россия?»

In 1890 Jacob Riis published "How the Other Half Lives", a book of photographs of New York tenements. His pictures of crowded rooms and dark alleys landed in a city proud of its money. Both worlds were real, and nobody could pretend they lived in different places.

That book is the starting point of this social commentary art painting. «Russia or Россия?» is one place with two faces, and I put both on the same canvas.

The upper half is a skyline of blue glass towers, a bridge and a low orange sun in a sky of rust and violet. The lower half is the other face. A leaning shack with a broken roof stands on the left. On the right are a stove, a table with dirty dishes and a radiator. The ground is flooded with plastic bottles and a discarded face mask.

In the middle sits a long-haired girl in a flower-patterned dress. She hugs her knees with her head resting on her arms, and she holds a red luxury shopping bag, the one clean, expensive object in the picture. Lines of handwritten text run across her foot. Glitch strips slice through the scene, and small pixel squares in pink, blue and orange are scattered over it like a damaged image file.

Her pose is a quote. Mikhail Vrubel painted "Demon Seated" in 1890, the same year as Riis's book, with the same hunched, folded-up body. I like swapping a fallen spirit for a girl with a shopping bag.

This is an original pop art painting from 2022, 120x90 cm, oil and acrylic on canvas, number 2 of 8 in my second collection «SCAM». The paint is built up in layers, so as mixed media wall art it rewards standing close.

Most of my original paintings are already in private collections, but I paint originals to order in any size. To ask about this one, message me on Instagram or by email. If you want the image at a smaller scale, there is also a hand-finished lithograph.