'The experience of migrating from my country has become a fertile ground for creativity and exploration, making me think about the idea of selfhood, identity and home in a foreign space.' —Lucia Fainzilber
In her third year of moving to New York, Buenos Aires-born artist Lucia Fainzilber created her camouflaged self-portrait series Somewear in which she examines the human struggle to find our own identity. Drawing on her background in costume design, she carefully selected different yet complementary patterns and fabrics to wrap or dress herself in and to create the backdrops. ‘We camouflage, as animals do or even soldiers, in order to survive,’ explains Fainzilber. ‘It’s our way of being inside a system.’ The resulting optical illusion highlights the undefined relationship between our true identity and our environment. In the present work, Untitled 31, a patchwork of brightly coloured floral patterns fills the frame – the only composition in the series in which she faces the camera, although her identity is protected by a potted thorny cactus she holds in front of her face. Debuting at auction, Fainzilber continues to live and work in New York.