Title: Test Run in Magenta
Inventory Number: APSP20102418
Medium: Silkscreen on newsprint paper
Dimensions: 24 x 18 in
Creation Date: 2010
Original Artwork by: Maria Lankina
Location Created: Miami, USA
Collection: Silk Screen Mixed Media 2010
Description:
Created during a period of raw experimentation in 2010, Test Run in Magenta is a spontaneous silkscreen impression on delicate newsprint — one of several instinctual test prints Maria Lankina made while cleaning the palette and playing with ink weight and registration. The piece captures her self-portrait in vibrant fluorescent magenta, diffused into a grainy halftone pattern reminiscent of vintage comic books and Warhol-era pop printing. The expression is cool and direct, set against faint green transfer residue and raw imperfections that amplify the immediacy and urgency of the process. This piece is not a polished edition but a studio artifact — a moment of hand-to-material interaction now preserved as a vintage fragment of her evolving practice.
Contextual Notes:
This piece is part of a larger body of screen-based works created in 2010, when Lankina was building out her Pop-infused portrait language using classical Warholian silkscreen techniques merged with gestural, performative applications. These test prints on fragile newsprint were originally byproducts of studio sessions but now stand as vintage works on their own — early evidence of Lankina's experimentation with repetition, self-imaging, and visual noise.