In this oil painting from 1984, the American artist Judy Rifka presents us with a fairly human Venus - it is a strongly diagonal close-up of her. In a gingerly movement, Venus shows us the intense contoured blue-white stars that rest on her left forearm - analogous to a mother with a child in her arm that has just been breastfed, she holds the stars and looks upon them lovingly. Due to the certain asymmetry of compositional structure of the painting, there is a noticeable fleetingness of the moment. The physiognomy was treated with clearly defined lines and the incarnate represents a concise mixture of turquoise-brown-red coloring. The brisk painterly technique and the rapidly applied brushstrokes prove Rifka's artistic ability. The figure acts slowly on a dark obscure background that has been painted with broad brushstrokes.
Text by Cezara-Maria Casian
