Zoë Pawlak’s figurative paintings examine human attempts at connection by expressing our capacity to shift towards intimacy after long periods of unrest. The women in the paintings are openly emotional, yet simultaneously strong as they bend and shift under burdens represented with humble use of line, colour and studied mark making. Their arms wrapped around their bodies, concealing themselves to protect or attempting to recapture the luxury of self-nurturing that is left behind when a life is lived for others. 

The body is an unyielding and fundamental expression of being: our innermost struggles and celebrations are recorded onto our physicality in the curve of a shoulder, the tilt of a head, the fade of a sigh. The body communicates more honestly than we want it to. 

The human form conveys the personal and universal—vulnerability, lust, lament, burden. We are dressed in our histories and burdens like invisible skins.