In her manipulated, history-style portraits, Deborah Oropallo deconstructs conventional tropes of painting to unearth their hidden social attitudes. She appropriates images of 17th and 18th century portraits of men from the Internet, layering over them erotic images of women in similar poses, embellished with painterly flourishes. Oropallo’s interventions strip the original images of their historical import and poise by placing potent male figures on the same plane as alluring females, and recognizing the paintings’ subjects as engaging in costuming, theater, and masquerade.

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