Enrique Breccia is a name I've only heard from other artists, and when I saw him on the guest list at Lake Como, I made it a point to stop by his table. As I flipped through his art, I could see why artists and collectors alike appreciated his work, but nothing jumped out until I saw this piece- I'm a sucker for images with reflections, and I spent a good amount of time just staring at the main figure and its reflection. And as I'm doing this, I also kept rotating the art to see how it looked with the reflections side by side or with the water reflection on top. I probably looked like a crazy person rotating the art around every which way. When I decided to buy it, Breccia said that it was the first time he saw someone stare so intently at the art, which he actually loved to see (so that was a relief, or just him being nice, which I'll still take).
As for the image itself, he said it was based on the myth of Narcissus (but female), and with the language barrier, I was too frazzled to ask how that actually fit (I remembered the story involved a reflection but not that there was a monstrous image). However, the contrast between the beautiful and grotesque was really interesting, and the waves in the water (which he did by hand) created some texture and added to the contrast between the clean and pretty half versus the rough and grotesque half. He signed it with the pretty half oriented on top, but given the composition and the Narcissus myth, I actually like it with the monstrous half on top (side by side works surprisingly well too), so I've included those as additional images for fun.
Thanks, Enrique (and the translator whose name I forgot)!
