Mini-retrospective
345 participants were painted for their passport portraits at Harbourfront centre during the mini-retrospective:
Doreen Wittenbols
Performative Painting: LOOK PAINT REPEAT + International Passport Paintings
June 1 - September 2, 2024
Gallery 235
Harbourfront centre, Toronto, CANADA
International Passport Paintings
You are invited to witness or participate in my International Passport Paintings project, whereby I will produce eight passport paintings per day, artworks that serve as part of your (future) I.D. but that also reference the days of analog photography. In my capacity as a Passport Painting Officer, I will use water soluble oil paint and archival paper to create swift portraits at my migration desk.
The experimental aspect of this project lies in the process of painting extremely quickly and not knowing the subject. Through the initial steps in starting a painting, in employing the formal elements of art, I break down the person visually, creating shapes and forms, light and dark. The project is therefore an exploration of my painting process.
There is no time to think—no time to judge who is sitting in front of me. I will challenge myself to treat each participant equally but at the same time strive to make a good painting. Through this way of working the portraits become less specific and perhaps less private and personal but hopefully still retain individuality.
345 participants were painted during the course of the exhibition. Appointments were scheduled at 30-minute intervals, and the actual portrait took 15 minutes or less.
Everyone is entitled to a free passport painting, but participants were encouraged to contribute a sliding scale donation ($0-$20 suggested). Wittenbols added the new portraits to a grid of previous works from Santa Fe and Paris, and together with Harbourfront, will eventually mail them back to their subjects.
Photo: LF Documentation