Rainy Brighton - an Ode to O. Hagalund

Acrylic painting with a retro feel, painted using an impasto technique for the background and inspired by the work of O. Hagalund.

Acrylic on canvas.

Dimensions: 40 x 50 x 1.3 cm.

About the artist:
Sam paints big-eyed females suspended between adolescence and adulthood; awkward, watchful, romantic and defiant. Their expressions are often difficult to place; shy but confrontational, fragile yet self-aware, as though they are caught in the moment of becoming. Sam is drawn to the visual language of her early teen culture; beauty columns, agony aunt pages, bedroom walls and the emotional intensity of growing up female. These references are painted with a nostalgic retro lens. The exaggerated eyes in her work act as emotional amplifiers. They invite connection, revealing an inner world that feels intimate but ultimately unreadable. She is interested in the awkward tension between wanting to be seen and wanting to disappear. At the heart of Sam’s work is an interest in femininity, nostalgia and the beauty of awkwardness.