Stroking Cattle, before… (2023)

A woman stands amidst a herd. Her face is obscured by the head of a cow, its horn cutting across her features—tenderness and obliteration in a single gesture. Barely visible on the animal’s forehead lies a crosshair: the anchor point of the compositional grid, left as a marker of what is to come.

The center of the woman’s dress remains unpainted—exposed white canvas bearing traces of color that evoke blood or the absence of a body beneath the fabric. The cattle in the background dissolve upwards into flat silhouettes, their formal language recalling prehistoric cave painting: a reminder that the human hand has, since the beginning, simultaneously depicted, revered, and killed the animal.

Before…—the title leaves the aftermath open. Before the slaughter. Before industry. Before a relationship between human and animal that could differ from anything we have known until now.