Ogled 2019

Curator: This is "Ogled," a 2019 work by Dragan Ilić Di Vogo. The artist has rendered this enigmatic portrait with gouache. What's your initial take? Editor: A fascinating tension. The subject's expression is strikingly realist, nearly photographic, yet she's adorned with such fantastical elements that belie realism. The textures, I’d hazard a guess the application of gouache, give everything a palpable surface. Curator: The subject's gaze certainly holds a peculiar gravity. Those spherical shapes surrounding her head—what do they evoke for you? They make me consider various traditions involving representations of fate and cosmos in the context of personal destiny, a heavy burden for one so young. Editor: Interesting. I see them as more akin to experimental adornment – like surrealist jewelry fashioned from glass or painted plastic. It raises questions of process – was this effect achieved through layering the gouache wet-on-wet? Also the choice to add certain industrial and sharp textures surrounding the girl: Are they signs of the commodification of childhood, a sort of consumption of innocence? Curator: Perhaps both are true. And do note, those bulbous elements on her head also resemble thought bubbles. Childhood, especially, is often seen as a vessel brimming with untold potential, represented by swirling ideas and unrealized possibilities. Also note that she’s not only wearing thought bubbles, but there are elements seemingly disgorging from her. This seems to suggest a moment when consciousness is almost being expelled and ejected out. It raises deep questions about interiority. Editor: And those colours: vivid but not celebratory. There's something almost bruised about the palette, which contributes to this sense of underlying unease, almost the result of layering different elements on a given skin. But also I'd say, looking at her eye: those seem very digitally worked and produced - which also gives us more emphasis of reality-turned-surreal. Curator: I agree, that digitally manipulated element seems highly plausible and fits well to its surreal feeling. It pushes our perceptions further away from a natural realism and further into the uncanny. Ultimately, Di Vogo manages to weave a web of dreamlike symbolism within the context of youthful expression. Editor: Absolutely, there’s this striking dichotomy: innocence framed within a visually unsettling industrial and cosmogonic artifice. What better metaphor for our increasingly fraught times?