Paulina Tsareva

Paulina paints on the blind brick ends of buildings in the port side of the city. Her work lasts longer here: the municipal crews take their time getting to these parts. By day she makes a living at her trade: touching up peeling shop signs, decorating stairwells, and drafting roll-up banners for local coffee shops. At night she pulls out the cans and paints what no one pays her for. Her subjects are simple: grass pushing through asphalt, other people's lit windows, and hands clutching small change. In the corner of every mural she leaves a mark: a little five-pointed star.

Her studio is set up in an old garage on Korabelnaya Street. Inside, cardboard stencils, cans of tint, and panel doors taken off their hinges are piled up together. Paulina has learned the neighborhood by touch: she knows what hour the deep shadow falls, when the watchman comes out, and which brick will drink the paint like a dry sponge. She refuses to photograph her walls, repeating that a painting stays alive only from below, while the viewer is standing on the ground.

Talking shop with her is easy, but a conversation about anything personal quickly dead-ends. Paulina deftly steers it toward primer density or the cold light before dawn. But touch on the right to urban space and she turns prickly at once. She speaks fast, in a low register; she often swallows her endings and hurriedly interrupts her own thoughts.