‘Ephemeral Antidotes’, a solo exhibition by artist Arabella Proffer, recently opened at SF’s Articulated Gallery. The large body of new works explore medical superstitions and the gruesome treatment practices of the past. While the paintings focus on Proffer’s signature style of imagined portraits that juxtapose old world aesthetics with flourishes of modern identity, this series is charged with a subtle confessional slant as Proffer spent time researching the horrors of past medical practices while convalescing from an aggressive form of cancer that caused the removal of part of her leg. This traumatic experience is chronicled in the obsessions and afflictions of her subjects to an intriguing effect. View more images of the new works below.
