'August and Other Stories'

This painting captures the mellow essence of spending time in a café. Sitting with a coffee, a croissant, and a book, we often observe others, who in turn observe us. We become performers as well as the audience. The work attempts to capture that sort of dance between the observer and the observed. Echoing of the yin and yang symbol, it amplifies the peaceful balance of the experience.

The title of this drawing is a line from the poem The Lady of Shalott (1832). In the poem, the Lady suffers from a mysterious curse and must continually weave images on her loom without ever looking directly out at the world. Instead, she looks into a mirror, which reflects the world around her castle. This work reflects the isolation, curiosity, and fear she must be feeling. Do we ever voluntarily curse ourselves not to see the world clearly?

'In our early twenties, somehow my friends and I started joking that if someone broke your heart, you should mail them a fish as retribution. I always found that a very compelling image, and this developed from that. In the painting, she's presenting the bouquet to you, which feels bolder than anonymously mailing a fish.' (Jeanine Brito)

The artist elegantly captured a ring that her grandmother passed down first to her mother and then to herself. The main focal point, the ring, tells stories of the past while inevitably interacting with the present. 

This retrospective painting captures the moment when the artist broke her leg, and ended up spending two months living with her grandparents, who took care of her. This painting is about that recovery period. It contrasts how difficult it was for her at that time, but looking back now was this idyllic stretch of summer days spent with people she loves very dearly. This painting attempts to capture that shift in memory—the incisions from surgery are still fresh, but she is lounging outside with gelato and a bottle of wine on a beautiful rug. 

How reliable are our memories? This self-portrait captures the fears around memory. The artist delicately indicates the fading accuracy with the hole in the cake slice.