By Jonathan Howcroft
Fortyfivedownstairs is temporarily home to some unfamiliar residents. Some of the residents would be unfamiliar to any home, let alone a whitewashed gallery space in a Melbourne CBD laneway. The incongruity is provided by Polish student Ewelina Madry’s expressive portraits of characters passing through a St Kilda Rooming House. Portraits that vividly capture the demons and fragilities of men and women facing acute challenges.
Ewelina described her project as an attempt to “immortalise” her subjects, to revere an overlooked section of Australian society. Rather than recoiling from men and women with multiple and complex needs, the artist has chosen to celebrate them. The result is confronting and voyeuristic. The natural inclination ‘not to stare’ is difficult to overcome, but, once governed, the vitality and resilience in the portraits radiates. With time, the images cease to be mug-shots of the desperate. The colours and movement reveal passionate, joyous, forceful personalities whose expressions belie their difficult circumstances.
Like art should, the exhibition challenges the viewer and exposes preconceptions. How did this person you’re staring at come to be in a Rooming House in St Kilda? What challenges were they facing at the moment the image was struck? The portraits illicit prejudice and compassion in equal measures once the inevitable judgements are drawn over the subjects’ predicaments.
The exhibition, appropriately titled: In Your Face, is quite that. A provocative and uncompromising exposure of human fragility beautifully executed.
In Your Face by Ewelina Madry is showing at fortyfivedownstairs from Tueesday 27 October, 2009 to Saturday 7 November, 2009. Admission is free.
