Bill and I braved the cold weather yesterday to see Sadko Hadžihasanović's suite of new paintings: "Close Shave" at Paul Petro on Queen West. We've been following Sadko's work for years and I was curious to see this new work which he had set in barber shops around the world.
We arrived early and had the artist to ourselves. Here he is in one of his self-portraits. When I learned Sadko was working from photographs I sent him some of the photos that Bill and I have taken in barber shops over the years and Sadko used some of them.
The paintings are oil paint on 10" by 10" wooden panels. This photo by the painter. The energetic paintings speak for themselves but I can tell you something about the subjects.
This painting is based on my photo of a friend getting his hair cut at Lloyd's Barbers in Toronto in 1998. The background lattice is the artist's invention.
Sadko also painted this portrait of Bill
getting a haircut from Mustapha in a barber shop in Istanbul in 2001. Great portraits of both figures!
This is Bill's photo of the artist and his model (me!) based on a picture Bill took in Palermo in 2002.
Love how the artist has rendered the flesh and the fabrics and the shaving cream.
Because we were alone, Sadko had time to tell us about the challenges of painting in a square format. The compressed, cropped, images carry quite a punch.
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p.s. I asked Sadko to help me pronounce his last name correctly: "Had-gee ha-SAN-oh-vitch". Show continues until February 19th.
