“Color is everything, black and white is more.”
Saint Jerome, 2021
A modern take on Caravaggio’s “Saint Jerome in His Study” painting, this work foregrounds the interplay between the loudness and the silence that defined 2021’s worldwide pandemic and the increased weight of social media. The subject of this drawing sits alone in the dark, illuminated by and preoccupied with two screens. After encountering Caravaggio’s work while studying in Rome, his eye for chiaroscuro and high-contrast lighting began to work its way into my pieces. Like this charcoal work, I aim to call upon the passions I have for Classical Studies and Visual Arts to execute contemporary visions.
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38’’x48’’
Charcoals on Strathmore paper
Drawn in early 2022
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Featured in San Francisco’s de Young Museum of Fine Arts “de Young Open 2023” , and in the Oakland Arts Review publication Volume 9
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Sold to a private collection in San Francisco, CA
Sala
A contemplative woman stares into the audience’s eyes, half shadowed. Sala is the name of my great aunt, who escaped from Auschwitz concentration camp by running through a potato field with a friend. The friend was killed by a farmer during this escape. Sala came to the United States and found refuge in Brooklyn, and my sister is now her namesake. Young Sala is pictured here, reflecting on our ancestry and half hiding herself in the face of the heated political debates around Judaism in America.
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18’’x24”
Charcoals on Strathmore paper
Drawn in late 2022
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Available
A Portrait of a Clock
Saul Lehv and Florence Benjamin, my great-grandparents, were a surgeon and art collector in New York City. Saul channelled his surgical talents and love for beauty into the collection and restoration of carriage clocks. Florence collected pieces from some of today’s biggest names in art before their height, indicating her keen eye for fine arts and love for expression. Their portrait, in the background of a clock, stands watching over this history and passage of time. This particular clock was a gift to my mother for her wedding, and though small in size, possesses a great deal of intricacy and beauty. A play on typical notions of a portrait, the clock stands in the foreground, with a larger carriage clock in the background to the left, and a faded picture of Saul and Florence on the right.
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11’’x14”
Charcoals on Strathmore paper
Drawn in early 2024
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Available
Daylight Through a Doorway
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11’’x14”
Charcoals on Strathmore paper
Drawn in early 2023
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Available
Monreale
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9’’x12”
Charcoals on Strathmore paper
Drawn in early 2023
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Available
She-Wolf
A commonly accepted legend about the foundation of Rome is that of the she-wolf nursing abandoned twins Romulus and Remus until they become men enough to battle over the land of present-day Rome. Romulus wins, hence the city’s name. In this drawing, my ‘Romulus’ lays within a modern context, illuminated by his device, backlighting the She-Wolf standing guard over him and staring off at something in the distance. She is his protector in such a way that allows him to let his guard down. As is my usual goal, I combine my love for Classical cultures with modern-day phenomena in hopes to emphasize the power of the two in relation to each other.
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27’’x40”
Charcoals on warm-toned paper
Drawn in early 2024
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Available
Self-Portrait
A young girl lies reading in the dark with a (hidden) flashlight in hand so as not to bother those sleeping across the room. The light illuminates her in such a way that the book’s pages wash out, her face and chest are highlighted, and the comfort of the bedding and her surroundings fade out to black. The bedding’s forms become ambiguous and figurative as the darkness creeps in around her.
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24”x18”
Charcoals on Strathmore paper
Drawn in late 2021
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Available, framed
Pandora
18”x24”, unavailable
Paper Scrolls
18”x18”, available
Still Life
18”x24”, available
