1990/1991 – DUPLICITY

Deceit is dangerous, threatening, and inconceivable in these works by Kourtev. Depicted figures are less than human but more than apparitions as their silhouettes lurk in shadow or stand, overly erect, in a simple outline. Using a greatly primary colour palette, Kourtev is able to create contrasts and highlights which seem to both disturb the eye in its search for a familiar figure, and set the piece ablaze. Works in this cycle each contain contrasts in dynamism, where one group of figures is in movement, the other is still, like they are paralyzed. It is in this visual unrest that emotional disquiet lives – making the viewer choose a state of inaction, or a state of malice, in a moment of horror.