On the whole, one could say that Fanny Horowitz’s art has been influenced by the Impressionists: the themes depicted in the works of Pierre Bonnard and Edouard Vuillard, or the distinctive colors used by the Fauvist, Henri Matisse – are her source and inspiration. The light, which varies according to the time of day, determines for Horowitz what the painted object looks like and, in order to probe a particular moment of the day, she makes use of photographs.

Horowitz was inspired by paintings of women by Auguste Renoir, all of whom are portrayed in predominantly female occupations: needlework, sewing, knitting, and washing. But, when searching for photographs of modern day female figures on the Internet, Horowitz, paradoxically decided that the women in her paintings would leave the matter of their occupation to the vivid imagination of the people observing them.
Next to those women, in her other works, she paints female objects, bedroom furnishings, pieces of clothing, and women’s toiletries. Both subjects have no clear solution: Where is this figure headed? Who’s the woman that’s smoking? Where is the figure, whose feet are on the table, sitting? She leaves the connection between the figures/women and the still lifes to the viewer’s perception of it, who can produce scenes of his own while creating a link between her different works – whether between two works, or even by connecting a number of works.

“I paint a description of a moment in time. A highly subjective moment for me…and also for the object and for the person observing the work.”

Horowitz talks about feelings that surfaced when she painted one of her works, whose subject is “Stiletto Heels”: they reminded of her daughter who, at the age of two or three, would hobble around in her mother’s high heels. One of her friends perceived them as shoes that had been thrown off following a dance party, whereas another person found a resemblance to some shoes she really liked, but were always too tight on her feet. Or, perhaps, one can see Cinderella in every pair of shoes?

“I prefer that the viewers remember my painting thanks to the experience it causes them to undergo, that it evokes emotions in them, so each viewer can tell himself his own unique story.”

Udi Rosenwein
June, 2014