In her new series of self-portraits, Julia Shanaytsa reflects on how protection can turn into isolation in today’s hyperconnected world. Her images capture quiet, intimate moments: the artist wraps herself in fabric, holds a pillow close. Her body seems to dissolve into the surrounding space, leaving only a hand, a foot, or a faint trace of her face, as anonymous as the objects around her.

Circular motifs recur throughout the series, restless and obsessive, like thoughts that refuse to fade. They embody an inner chaos where feelings and reflections intertwine and perception becomes blurred.

These forms also allude to the digital noise of everyday life: news feeds, notifications, endless messages. Like soap bubbles, they flare up and vanish, leaving behind only a sense of overload. In this way, Shanaytsa connects the personal and the social dimensions.

An additional layer of distance is created by melted plastic placed between the image and the viewer. It does not fully conceal but gently distorts, becoming a metaphor for protection; fragile, barely visible, yet undeniably present. This is how the artist envisions modern psychological defense: delicate, distorted, but necessary.

Despite the familiar domestic setting, the works convey a deep sense of loneliness, detachment, and an unfulfilled longing for closeness.

Shanaytsa reveals how, in the contemporary world, a person creates their own cocoon, a space suspended between withdrawal and dissolution, between the desire for protection and the risk of losing oneself.