Glamorous Lady

Painting Description: Glamorous Lady
Artist: Valeria Notarnicola
Date: 2025
Medium: Acrylic, ink, and pencil on canvas
Dimensions: 60 cm x 50 cm

Artist Statement

Glamorous Lady is a bold, irreverent portrait that merges pop surrealism with gritty domestic realism. A woman sits on a toilet, unapologetically defiant, her body draped in white undergarments, her expression hidden behind oversized sunglasses. Curlers grip her unkempt auburn hair, suggesting a routine interrupted—or perhaps a refusal to conform to one.

The cigarette held in her mouth curls upward, surrealistically morphing into an abstract blue plume. Her crossed arms and tilted head form an X-shaped composition that suggests both vulnerability and resistance. She is caught between glamor and grunge, idealism and indifference.

The background is split: turquoise bathroom tiles border a hot pink wall, while to the right, a paper roll stretches into a rainbow path, clashing with a bottle-green silhouette. The toilet itself—traditionally a symbol of privacy and bodily function—is transformed here into a throne of irony, elevating the mundane into a stage of theatrical self-presentation.

At once humorous and haunting,Glamorous Lady plays with the aesthetic of ‘ugly beauty’—a raw femininity layered in contradiction. The viewer is left to wonder: is she indifferent, empowered, or simply tired? The answer may not matter as much as the act of looking itself.

This work is part satire, part self-portraiture of a collective feminine experience, and all attitude. With thick outlines, saturated color blocks, and exaggerated anatomy, the painting feels both deeply personal and defiantly performative—like smoking in silence just to feel the moment stretch.