BLACK BOARD

Yasmin Sison's paintings are masking devices which can be viewed formalistically as an interplay of contrasts between reality and perceptual texture. Her method of painting approximates the gloss of photographs with the very materiality of paint itself. The preoccupation with the images of young girls persists within Dilaw na Damit (Yellow Dress) (Lot 704) as Sison evokes the semblance of her younger self, as well as the archetype of all little girls, depicted within liminal and dreamy contexts, such as a forest floor rich with meaning and connotation. In the way minor details and trappings of childhood can hold a world of meaning within an adult's remembrance and nostalgia of their early selves, the yellow dress is given special mention as Sison intimates that the pretty frock will be what the little girl recalls of her youth, years forward. Blackboard (Lot 705) hails from Sison's earlier series of effaced paintings which portrays teenage girls or young women, with their facial features - the stamp of their individuality - blotted out. Presented in tableaux of everyday situations against hyperreal backgrounds, the faceless girls enact the motions of going through life without clear orientation or psychological focus, creating a suspended state of animation.