Work > Writing

This short text was published upon invitation by ArtForum to name a favorite show of the past year.

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Valerie Hegarty

Polina Barskaya (Monya Rowe Gallery, New York) Barskaya’s show “Brightwater Avenue” was the antidote to the hollow-resounding, oversize, and overproduced painting exhibitions of the past year. Recalling Morandi in scale, color, and focus, Barskaya shuffles and reshuffles her subjects: herself and her husband, furniture, blankets, books, plants, windows, and light. Each modestly scaled canvas is a portal into the artist’s private life, and she stares back at the viewer directly and inscrutably in moments of repose. Time slows down within the accumulations of brushed observations in Bonnardesque strokes—the paintings offer interior echoes that grow exponentially, much like the matryoshka dolls from the artist’s native Ukraine.