Expressive Faceless Portraits by Salman Khoshroo

White on White Portraits (2019) by Salman Khoshroo, Brush Impasto, 30 x 30cm, Oil on Wood Panel.

Iran-based artist Salman Khoshroo is no stranger to creating faces without features. White on White is one of his latest series – the artist focuses on moulding paint with a palette knife into silent human portraits, their sentiments sealed within and trapped behind their obscured appearance.

Growing up in New York, Iranian born Salman went on to study at the Australian National University, where he received a degree in Digital Art. Currently back in Iran, Khoshoroo lives and works in his Tehran studio, creating abstract figures evoking emotional tension.

“De Kooning once famously said, ‘Flesh is the reason oil paint was invented’. For him, flesh mainly meant the skin, but for me, it cuts all the way down to the bones,” says Khoshoroo. “Perhaps with an inherent sculptural mentality, I shape and arrange the paint, not to exactly mimic, but move along the brink of representation.”

The result of taking a substance as obscure as paint and in a few strokes moulding it into something recognisable and alive is what drives Khoshoroo. “The substance of paint, with its flesh potential, is moulded to find a spark, and capture the potency of life,” says the talented artist.

The white series is painted with a single pigment, in a sandbox method, and the faces are the result of applying layers of thick paint with bold strokes, forming abstract images of the human face. While the portraits do not portray typical physical features, the emotions imbued within the paintings are rich with sentiment and feeling.

Knife Impasto Portraits (November 2019) by Salman Khoshroo, 20 x 20cm, Oil on Wood Panel.

“Moving around the paint to form faces, finding people that make you feel something, people you didn’t even know you were looking for,” says Khoshoroo. “In this series of portraits, the features are not defined, instead the aim is to capture a human spark with minimal intervention.”

The abstract images are reminiscent of work from the Impressionist period, where artists turned away from the fine details of reality and aimed to capture the momentary, sensory effect of life. Much like the Impressionists, Khoshoroo uses a loosened brushstroke and his work contains either all-white or pure, intense colours.

Wool on Foam Portraits Series (2020) by Salman Khoshroo, 20 x 20cm.

Simply looking at his previous work, Flesh Potential or Monotone Portraits, one can see the power of saturated red faces or blue or white. By abandoning linear perspective used to create clarity of form, the paintings, while displaying an unfished appearance, are richly evocative. His latest works, wool on foam portraits, are equally mesmerising.

Instead of relying on perfect symmetry, Khoshroo’s focus is on creating an ephemeral moment, untethered by the details of reality and physical accuracy.