In Relation

For many years, the human figure has been a constant presence within Clare Dubina’s practice. She has returned to it again and again, exploring the body not as a portrait of a particular person, but as a way of expressing something less tangible: emotion, identity, vulnerability, connection and the quiet complexity of being human.

The figures within these works exist in moments of occupying space together and alone. They reflect the many ways we move through relationships with one another and with ourselves: seeking connection, finding comfort, creating distance, offering support, or simply existing alongside another.

But In Relation also speaks to Dubina’s own relationship with the figure as an artist. After years of returning to the human form, this body of work represents a culmination of that exploration. It is an opportunity to reflect on what the figure has allowed Dubina to express, discover and understand, while also making space for what comes next.

The figure is familiar, yet endlessly open to interpretation. A body can hold emotion without speaking. A gesture can suggest an entire inner world. And two bodies sharing space can say something about connection that words cannot.

In Relation is ultimately a reflection on connection between bodies, between people, between the inner and outer self, and between an artist and the subject that has accompanied Dubina for so long, and a quiet acknowledgement of where her work is beginning to lead me next.