Next door to Ramiken gallery was Romanian artist Marius Bercea’s show Blue Silk. I love portraits and the show at the Francois Ghebaly gallery was right up my alley.

“Across the exhibition, Bercea’s subjects quietly and solemnly enact the rituals of interior life. Each figure, cloistered in his corner of the domestic labyrinth, appears petrified in moments of respite or pensive focus. Gestures are inward and gazes conspicuously averted. The exhibition title alludes fittingly to Pablo Picasso’s ‘Blue Period,’ a short and monochrome stretch of the artist’s early career defined by melancholy, contemplation, and figurative solitude. Sour Milk (George) (2022) and So white the light (2022) are particularly evocative and feature two figures who appear to face each other, each seated before a swathe of blue backdrop. Although the composition suggests togetherness, the scene is divided in two separate canvases, further divorcing the figures as their glances already seem to avoid both viewer and each other.” (Francois Ghebaly)