Twisted ツイステッド

M.Dumas is a white woman born in Capetown, South Africa. After graduating from college she moved to Amsterdam in the Netherlands, and has been active as a Dutch artist since the eighties. Dumas gave birth to a daughter in 1989, and as the child has grown, her subject has changed from immature and uncanny images of an infant, to a pubescent child and in recent years to a more mature and sensual female figure. "Twisted" was shown in the exhibition "Youth and other Demons", her first one-person show in Japan, in 1996. As the title indicates, the painting shows a young boy with his body twisted so that he looks over his shoulder at the viewer. It is painted with soft colors and a fluid touch reminiscent of watercolor. This rendering makes the figure of the boy, who appears to be black, seem to melt into its background, but his eyes are strong as he stares at back at the viewer. One senses a deep anxiety toward the gaze of the other and a melancholy sensuality, typical of adolescence, that slowly penetrates the heart of the viewer.