ARTWORK
CURRENT WORK
SOFT BODIES
SOFT BODIES is a series of textile works by Ona Sadkowsky.
Positioned between figure, fragment and projection, the works explore the body as a site of vulnerability, distortion and unstable identity.
Rendered in soft material yet formally reduced, the pieces move between tenderness and unease, intimacy and estrangement. Faces, organs, garments and hybrid creatures appear as simplified signs - almost playful at first glance, yet psychologically charged beneath their surface.
In Soft Bodies, softness does not suggest comfort. It becomes a condition of exposure: a body without armour, a presence in transition, a form shaped by desire, memory, humour and discomfort. The works draw on the visual language of cartoon, symbol and caricature, while resisting pure readability.
The series reflects Ona Sadkowsky’s ongoing interest in identity, projection and emotional states translated into condensed visual form.
LOSS OF COMPOSURE (2026)
35 X 20 CM / WOOL
PRIVATE AREA (2026)
20 X 12 CM / WOOL
DISTURBED SIGNALS
The series DISTURBED SIGNALS brings together "The Exterior Is a Performance", "Signal Interruption" and "Held Together".
The series treats image, identity and exterior appearance as unstable constructions shaped by interruption, staging and distortion. Across the works, the visible surface appears not as something fixed, but as something negotiated and under pressure.
Performance, simulation and technological mediation are approached here as conditions that shape contemporary communication, attention and human presence.
THE EXTERIOR IS A PERFORMANCE (2023 - 2026)
200 X 100 CM / ACRYLIC ON CANVAS
HELD TOGETHER (2026)
100 X 120 CM / MIXED MEDIA ON CANVAS
SIGNAL INTERRUPTION (2026)
50 X 60 CM / MIXED MEDIA ON CANVAS
EARLIER WORK
ABSTRACTS
This series marks a shift in Ona Sadkowsky’s practice from explicit figuration towards a more abstract and indirect visual language. Across three paintings, familiar forms are reduced, displaced and reorganised into compositions that resist fixed narrative.
Rather than communicating through defined figures, the works operate through relation, tension and suggestion. Meaning remains present, but less declared - carried by fragments, signs and formal instability.
SUNDAYS AT THE RIVIERA (2023)
100 X 120 CM / MIXED MEDIA ON CANVAS
IN DIALOGUE WITH ONESELF (2023)
100 X 120 CM / MIXED MEDIA ON CANVAS
DEEP CONNECTION (2023)
100 X 120 CM / MIXED MEDIA ON CANVAS
LARGE-SCALE PAINTINGS
These large-scale paintings centre on figuration as a spatial and pictorial force. Bodies, faces and hybrid forms appear enlarged and unstable, occupying the canvas with tension, density and visual presence.
Rather than describing fixed narratives, the works use figuration as a formal structure through which distortion, contrast and image pressure unfold.
CONNECTED ODDS (2019)
200 X 100 CM / ACRYLIC ON CANVAS
(IN PRIVATE COLLECTION)
TENDERCLOUD (2018)
200 X 100 CM / ACRYLIC ON CANVAS
(IN PRIVATE COLLECTION)
THE GARDEN OF EXISTENCE
200 X 100 CM / ACRYLIC ON CANVAS
(IN PRIVATE COLLECTION)
FIGURES
Figures belongs to the early groups of works in Ona Sadkowsky’s practice. Most of the paintings centre on a single figure or creature, rendered in a highly coloured, bold and immediately recognisable visual language.
The works are defined by presence, reduction and strong visual placement. The figure appears not as a narrative motif, but as an autonomous and direct form.
CITY-FOX (2017)
80 X 120 CM / ACRYLIC ON CANVAS
THE GOLDEN TEARDROP (2018)
50 X 60 CM / ACRYLIC ON CANVAS
(IN PRIVATE COLLECTION)
TRAPPED (2020)
50 X 60 CM / ACRYLIC ON CANVAS
PHOTOGRAPHY
ARCHIVE OF IDENTITIES
Archive of Identities is a photographic and video-based series that considers identity as a variable and situational image form. The works present different aspects, states and modes of appearance of a person, continuously reconfigured through image, framing and degrees of visibility.
Works such as "Still Female", "Anatomy of Restricted Expression" and "Withheld Presence" approach portraiture not as the depiction of a stable self, but as a field of shifting scenarios of presence, expression and withdrawal.
ARCHIVE OF IDENTITIES, FRAGMENT N. 2:
STILL FEMALE.
EDIBLE FROM THE WAIST DOWN.
UNTOUCHABLE EVERYWHERE ELSE.
(2017)
ARCHIVE OF IDENTITIES, FRAGMENT N. 2:
WITHHELD PRESENCE
(2025)
FIELD NOTES
Field Notes is a photographic series that gathers fragments, traces and fleeting visual constellations from everyday life. Surfaces, objects and incidental arrangements are treated not as background, but as sites of attention and formal charge.
The works operate as visual notes: concise recordings of atmosphere, relation and perception, shaped through selection, framing and proximity.
WRONG HABITAT (2025)
PRIVATE ROUTINES & PUBLIC EXCESS (2025)
ASCENT & DESCENT (2017)