Ana Makharadze, curator of the exhibition I Was Always Good, sat down in the studio with painter Tallulah Dirnfeld to discuss her artistic practice:
Abigail Ogilvy Gallery: WHAT DOES THE COLLAPSE OF PERFECTION MEAN TO YOU?
Tallulah Dirnfeld: “The themes behind my work circle around perfection, or rather, the absence of it. At their core, they are about control. I keep finding myself drawn back to the imagery of rituals of discipline, the tension between being the good girl, the bad girl, and all the blurred spaces in between. The collapse of perfection is just that, an unraveling ode to the past, and to the fragile structures we once believed could hold everything in place.”
AOG: DO YOU LIKE YOUR WORK?
TD: “Yes.”
AOG: WHY TURN TO AMERICANA AS A LENS FOR SURRENDER?
TD: “The use of pink Floridian carpet, horses, sailor costumes, and blueberry cheesecake all appear throughout my work. These elements act as portals for nostalgia. My shading remains intentionally two-dimensionalesque. Caught mid-action, yet unmoving. Within that stillness, I find a sense of calm and comfort in what has passed. And yet, It carries a heartwrenching reality of not being able to go back.”
AOG: WHAT INSPIRES YOU?
TD: “Dolls.”
AOG: WHAT’S YOUR FAVORITE MEMORY?
TD: “One of my favorite memories is actually simple. Spending New Year’s Eve at home in Bridgehampton with my family, watching Roman Holiday and waking up the next day to do a puzzle. It wasn’t glamorous, but it felt perfect.”
AOG: TELL US ABOUT THE SELF-PORTRAITS.
TD: “I wouldn’t even call them self-portraits, more like avatars. It feels boring, even cliche, to say that social media has fractured us into proxies of ourselves, but it’s true and worth repeating. These girls, whether you read them as me or not, are faceless, eyes closed. I hate being perceived really. And even though I still am, I want no part in it. These figures embody that refusal. They carry the quiet, intuitive self-destruction that comes from holding yourself back, from hindering who you are.”
Tallulah Dirnfeld is a Los Angeles-based artist known for her emotionally charged oil paintings that blend Surrealism with psychological depth. A self-taught painter with a background in horror film productions, Dirnfeld crafts haunting, dreamlike scenes that explore themes of memory, identity, and femininity. Dirnfeld, in 2024, presented her debut solo exhibition at Sade Gallery. She completed residency at La Scuola Internazionale Di Grafica in Venice, Italy, and is currently presenting her solo exhibition, I Was Always Good, at Abigail Ogilvy Gallery in Los Angeles.
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