“..all the pictures I paint have a story. Stories I’ve heard, seen and lived. In a way, I am making the quotidian extraordinary. I also look a little like the pictures I paint. I just observe the moment, without talking. My paintings are also just looking.”

The women that confront us with the identity of “Fadu” in the paintings of Aysegül Sagbas are child-women despite the fact that they convey a more feminine attitude compared to the subjects of her previous work. The “Fadu”s in a way represent the painter herself. They are also today’s women that for centuries haven’t been able to change their fate and save themselves from always being “the other” no matter how hard they have tried. In the face of the meaningless seriousness of life – one inevitably dies in the end, Fadu’s resorting to games and naivety poses a contrast with the sometimes surprised, sometimes sullen look in her eyes. This is also the tension point of the painting. The artist, while painting Fadu hanging her laundry or reading love letters on her bed does not represent a critical stand, but observes the daily female rituals that for them are solely a form of existing. These women keep waiting for an emancipation that will save them from their ordinary routines. Between their simple action they watch us, and they know they are being watched.
The painter, in her works, accepts and uses a language that she, herself, has created. This language isn’t limited to her approach to painting, but also encompasses her technique. This plastic language that is characteristic to the painter is an indication of her originality.

Füruzan Simsek
October, 2009