Very often, negative space is just as important to our understanding of form as the form itself.  Think about clouds– their beauty is most apparent when surrounded by bright blue sky.  In Portuguese artist Cristina Troufa’s work, the painter uses simple lines and negative space to punctuate her compositions, choosing to highlight the flesh which makes her figures essentially human.

Her concentration of color and light on the exposed flesh of her subjects speaks to our tendency to judge on appearance, often unable to look past the person we think we see and notice each other for who we really are.

Her compositions are simple, the backgrounds stark, only a detail left to us here or there.

What do we see when we fill in the blanks?  Who are these women, this boy?  What is this moment we’ve caught them in?  Have we been there before?

To see more of Cristina Troufa’s work, please visit her website and her page on Meseon.

Featured image is Salto.  All images are via Cristina Troufa’s page on Meseon.