A Reflection of Self

A Reflection of Self

Oil on canvas, painted as a study in stillness and surrender.

A woman floats just beneath the surface, her body releasing into deep blue water. Above her, her own reflection meets her. Two versions of the same person, one falling and one rising, separated by nothing but the surface tension between doing and being.

She is not drowning. She is choosing to stop swimming.

This painting began as a reminder to myself. After years of producing, performing, teaching, mothering, and building, I realised I had forgotten how to be still. We are taught that rest is earned. That you have to deserve the pause. But rest is not a reward. It is the foundation. Without it, everything we build is built on exhaustion.

The blue is deliberate. It is not the blue of sadness. It is the blue of depth. The kind of quiet that only arrives when you stop moving long enough to hear yourself. The white dress billows like a breath the body is finally releasing.

What Makes This Unique:

This is one of my figurative oil studies, a departure from my abstract cartographic work but connected by the same thread: the search for home. In my Maps to Milk series, home is a place. In this painting, home is a state. The woman is not floating in an ocean. She is floating in the space between urgency and peace, and she is choosing peace.

The reflection above is not a mirror. It is a question: what would you look like if you allowed yourself to stop? Most of us do not know. This painting is permission to find out.

Life is not to work. Life is to be.

Details:

Medium: Oil on canvas Original Size: A3 (29.7 x 42.0cm) Year: 2022 Series: Portrait Studies Certificate of Authenticity included Ships in protective packaging from Sydney, Australia

Original available. New to market.

I'm Brigitte Gerges, a Lebanese-Australian artist and UNESCO Art Ambassador. My work has been exhibited internationally, including at the Florence Biennale. I create art as an act of choosing yourself, because my family fled war to give me this freedom, and I'm not wasting it.

Shipping:

Australia: 5-7 business days International: 10-14 business days Tracked and insured

Questions? Email hello@brigittegerges.com