Toronto based artist Ibrahim Abusitta paints inviting yet eerie group portraits of fun gatherings and social spaces in his series "A Past Life that Exists for Nostalgia"
Each painting is filled with an ominous wash of colour, a rust orange, neon fuchsia, and muted burgundy, tinting the scenes with an emotional backdrop. They capture a cinematic moment, a movie still that has been eroded with time with details that have faded away. The texture of the wood-grain surface comes through the pigment, and details have been scratched into the façade with a desperation for familiarity. The faces of his figures remain anonymous, lacking in specificity and because of this, they feel untied to reality. Their existence is warped through the painter's lens, like a lost connection or a distorted memory.
This body of work by Ibrahim Abusitta is saturated with a deep longing for people and places unknown. When considering these paintings, we are overwhelmed with a desire to visit the past and reshape our own memories and experiences.
