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Natalie Rozenbaum was born in the picturesque and historic Russian city of Krasnoyarsk, in 1981. Steeped in history, this powerful industrial city is situated along one of the most beautiful Siberian rivers, the Enisey. Krasnoyarsk, also surrounded by mountains, undoubtedly gave Rozenbaum the inspiration to later specialize in cityscapes paintings. Not long after graduating from college, Rozenbaum immigrated to Israel, where she makes cityscapes of her new homeland the main subject of her painting. Her uniqueness stems from her vivid imagination, which turns ordinary scenes into the fantastical. Her subject matter encompasses buildings, streets, as well as people, and sometimes the desert beyond the ocean. But, it is not the reality of city-life that she paints; rather it is the palpable energy that emanates from it; the living, breathing presence with all the separate parts that interrelate to create this urban organism. The people of her paintings are stripped to their essence, so as to emphasize their purpose; just as the houses they inhabit retain only the symbols of a home, windows, doors, perhaps an allusion of a wall or two. By eliminating the superfluous, Rozenbaum's works become narratives that leave the rest to the observer's imagination. This artist's approach is similar to El Greco's, in that she dramatizes rather than describes. One sees, too, the influence of Van Gogh's energetic and punctuated style, where paintings come alive with movement, expression, an abundance of color, and an abbreviation of detail. |