Doubt is the Shadow of Truth
Since the production of my series of artworks Cathédrales in 2014, the shadow is a recurrent theme and tool in my work. With this mural painting I would like persons passing in the street as well as persons working in Fabrika to reflect upon the complex reality of perception. What ones experiences as a fact could merely be a mind construction. The phenomenon of hand shadow puppet is a simple and effective metaphore for this experience of a constructed truth. I chose for the mural painting at Fabrika for a XIXth century drawing of a shadow hand puppet by Burshill : “the goose prisonner’.
The title of the work, ‘Doubt is the shadow of truth’*, is written on the wall under the drawing (in Russian). This text illustrates the image and stimulates the thinking of viewers. Is the reality that I am experiencing, the truth?
How can one influence upon the perception of truth?
The shadow becomes a tool to impose its power of projection of a constructed reality. This is the theme of the renowned philosophical text of Plato about the cave. The same shadow also can be a tool to mentally free oneself from a given situation, as a support for imagination and empowerment. It could be the case for the flying bird.
*from the quote from Ph.J.Bailey “Where doubt is, there truth is – it is her shadow.” (‘Festus: a Poem’, 1839, p.83)
Doubt is the Shadow of Truth, 2025
Wall painting in Center for Creative Industries Fabrika, Moscow.
Work commissioned by the French Institute in Russia.
Mural painting in fresco technique in black paint,
3 x 4 meters.
Street View
Assia Filippova, director of Center for Creative Industries Fabrika, Moscow.
Ph.J.Bailey “Where doubt is, there truth is – it is her shadow.” (‘Festus: a Poem’, 1839, p.83)