“An alternative self implies other, implies I.”
- Joshua Raynham
My Alternate Self is an exploration of identity—a journey into the heart of who we are versus who we think we should be. It’s like looking in a mirror and seeing both the reflection and the distortion, the person we recognise and the one we barely know. The artist, who has spent years crafting intricate, classical works on canvas, has now taken a bold step into uncharted territory: painting on human skin, turning bodies into living, breathing sculptures.
This shift in medium is more than just a change of tools—it’s a metaphor for the struggle between external appearance and internal truth. The human body, once a passive canvas, now becomes a space for transformation. It’s as though the body is a landscape, each brushstroke an exploration of hidden emotions and unseen parts of the self. In this series, the artist takes what is traditionally static and makes it dynamic, breathing life into the paint as it moves and shifts with the contours of the body. It's an abstract dance between form and feeling, a delicate balance of vulnerability and strength.
Through these pieces, she invites us to consider the contradictions that shape our identity: the mask we wear to the world versus the raw truth that we keep hidden within. Like a peeled-back layer of skin, the paint reveals fragments of the self—some familiar, some foreign, all tangled up in the complex web of who we are. The boundaries between who we present to others and who we are when we stand alone begin to blur, making us question if there’s ever a single, true version of ourselves.
In My Alternate Self, the artist doesn't just paint the body—she inhabits it. She allows her imagination to take over, allowing raw emotion to guide the brush. It's a journey of self-discovery and transformation, where creativity becomes a way of navigating the fractured, fluid nature of identity. The work is a reminder that, like the paint on a living canvas, we are always shifting, always changing, and perhaps the truest form of ourselves is something we will never fully grasp—an alternate self, forever in motion.
