PolinaBortina
Polina Bortina explores the memory of material through textile, object and texture. At the centre of her practice are the trace of time, the vulnerability of the surface and the possibility of repair through an artistic gesture.
Polina works in mixed media: canvas, acrylic, relief pastes, smalt, ceramic, stained glass and textile. In her works the surface becomes a living body — it is cut, shifted and reassembled. The tear is not concealed but emphasised: the line of damage turns into a seam, and the seam into a source of light and meaning.
The artist turns to ornament as a language of cultural memory — Slavic, Persian, Japanese — and to the crack as a language of personal memory. Between them a practice unfolds in which the acknowledgement of fragility becomes the foundation of a new wholeness.
Polina's works are meant for slow, almost tactile perception. They slow the gaze and invite a move from superficial recognition to concentrated observation — to the place where form shows through beneath the pattern.
Draft text: replace with the artist's biography.Destruction here becomes a form of restoration, and the scar the central element of the composition.— Polina Bortina
