Blue Quiet Memory 2018

Editor: This is Jana Brike’s “Blue Quiet Memory,” an oil painting from 2018. There's a dreamy quality to the piece... a nude figure with long hair stands on a beach. The beach landscape creates an unusual sense of intimacy. What's your take? Curator: The figure's back is presented to us with the backdrop, seemingly a tattoo, as the focal point of our, and the painting’s, attention. It invites an important question – what exactly is being memorialized here? Is the artist trying to engage the idea of how trauma may present or, conversely, what natural beauty may overcome? What does "memory" do, both personally, and publicly, in such conditions? Editor: Trauma is interesting, I hadn't considered it! It's unexpected but makes me wonder about the place of nudes and nudity, and their association with objectification, because this feels like it’s saying something completely different. Curator: Right, it resists easy categorization. Think about the history of the nude in art. Often it’s about power dynamics – the male gaze, ownership. But here, Brike seems to subvert that. The nude figure is on a beach, that creates some visual poetry. How does the natural setting challenge conventional perceptions linked with those established visual cues? Does this alter expectations, forcing us to consider broader perspectives? Editor: The moth on her back – it's almost incomplete. It isn't finished, right? Curator: Exactly! That brings up interesting concepts – fragility, transformation, process, change – both personal and social. The artist creates this sense of not being fully resolved, or defined. It evokes feelings of becoming… rather than simply *being.* Think about how societal expectations are so often wrapped around *being,* or about permanence, fixed narratives, that shape ideas of acceptability and conformity. Editor: It feels so relevant! So much to think about. Curator: It does challenge us. To go beyond the obvious, looking past the expected… the need to consider how art both reflects *and* shapes public conversation about identity, history, and culture.