Under the title Sub Rosa, this series brings together works in which the rose does not appear as a decorative symbol, but as a narrative element. It is not an ornament placed upon the body, but part of a quiet visual language shaped by concepts, emotional states, and transience.
The expression sub rosa originates in ancient and medieval tradition. A rose placed above a room signified that whatever was spoken beneath it was not to leave that space. The rose thus became a symbol of secrecy, silence, and the unspoken. It is precisely within this tension between concealment and revelation that the series unfolds.
Each of the five works revolves around a distinct inner condition. Cupiditas (desire, longing) explores not merely attraction, but the tension between yearning and possession. In Dominium (dominion, control), power becomes physical and immediate: the rose is tightly enclosed and crushed in the hand, beauty transformed into possession. Tacita (the silent one) retreats into constriction and silence; here the rose almost seals the entire expression of the face. Finally, Ruptura (rupture, fracture) captures the moment when tension can no longer remain concealed. The rose itself remains untouched, yet its lines cut across the body like a visible trace of inner division. Vanitas (transience, vanity, mortality) dissolves the series into stillness and decay. The petals no longer appear as signs of beauty, but as traces of its inevitable disappearance.
The role of the rose changes throughout the cycle. It appears as blossom, thorned stem, crushed fragment, or already withering remnant. Rendered in black and white, it loses its decorative character and becomes form, texture, and a visible trace of impermanence.
The words themselves were executed in Capitalis Rustica, a Roman script whose elegance still retains something physical and immediate. It feels less like typography applied to the skin than like a temporary inscription emerging from it. The decision to use Latin was likewise not made for decorative reasons. The language creates a distance from the present, removes the terms from immediate categorisation, and lends them a certain timelessness. The words are not intended as direct statements, but as fragments from an older and deeper field of meaning.
Sub Rosa is a series about what remains concealed — about states that become visible before they can fully be spoken.
