The Cherry Blossom Alley, 2023
Acrylic on canvas
38.2 × 51.2 in
When the mirror dissolves into the landscape, the face-to-face no longer unfolds between two bodies, but between who one is and the image one projects of oneself.
With The Cherry Blossom Alley, Abraham Aronovitch extends the Behind the Obvious series by shifting the motif of the bathroom mirror toward an exterior space that has become mental. The mirror is no longer visible, but internalized: the scene operates as a surface of projection where the individual confronts social narratives and expected images of the self. The painting thus explores the construction of identity through the tension between lived present and anticipated future.
Within this blossoming alley turned mental screen, the mirror no longer returns a physical image, but an intimate division. The female figures embody two simultaneous temporalities: one oriented toward an idealized image, the other anchored in the present moment. As is often the case in the artist’s work, the composition reveals a silent instability in which desire and norm coexist. The painting keeps this tension open, without resolution or hierarchy, inviting the viewer to inhabit the space between who one is and who one imagines becoming.