I make romantic, narrative paintings in which miniature characters, both because of their size and the fact that many of the figures are children, play out dynamics of desire and power. The works are saturated, carnivalesque and feminine. The lines are soft and the figures have curly hair.

I borrow painting techniques from renaissance and folk art. The references to folklore and the miniature scale express an impossible desire to know the world. They entertain the possibility of utopia provided by fairy tales and folklore, the possibility of closure and virtue – yet their nar- ratives are not fixed.

My canvases have varying degrees of finish. Areas of tighter, more traditional painting tech- niques merge with unfinished, more expressive areas. I expose the process of painting in layers over time and make a bridge between past and present developments in painting.

-Justine Neuberger