PERSONALITY

How much of who we are comes from others?

The Construction of Freedom

STAGE 01 / 05

Who am I?

There are so many people inside me.

An autocratic father
friends from the neighbourhood
the men I have loved
and my wonderful mother

In the mirror
I see their touch.

Barbara Puto, 1997

Where do others end and you begin?

Personality / Osobowość
2026

120 × 80 cm

Oil on stretched linen-cotton canvas
Michael Harding, Rembrandt, Schmincke and Van Gogh oil colours
Michael Harding Oil Paint Medium No. 1
Winsor & Newton Artists’ Retouching Varnish
Tools: Traditional painting tools
Software: None used in the creation of the artwork
Final protective varnish will be applied in December 2026, after sufficient curing time.

CONTINUE THE JOURNEY → CONDITIONING

Personality

Personality is the starting point of The Construction of Freedom. Before asking what limits us, I wanted to ask a more fundamental question: what are we actually made of?

The central figure is a woman because, in Polish, the word osobowość — personality — is feminine. She is nude to remove costume, status and disguise. Her body remains deliberately unfinished because personality is never complete. It continues to change through relationships, experience, memory and choice.

Around and within her, other people appear — those who loved, supported, hurt or simply influenced her. Different colours remain on the body like traces of these encounters. They do not form a separate background; they become part of her construction.

Yet influence is not the same as determination. The figure is still emerging from what has shaped her.

The question is therefore not simply who made me who I am?

It is: where do others end — and where do I begin?

I begin with an imprimatura. I don't know everything about her yet, but one thing is already clear: she has to be lighter than her surroundings. Personality needs its own light.

01. SHE NEEDS HER OWN LIGHT.

She has to be nude — not erotically, but honestly. Clothes would immediately start telling another story: status, taste, age, belonging. I don't want any of that here. I want the person underneath. Their true self.

02. NO CLOTHES. NO DISGUISE.

I paint other people. They seep into her, enter her space and begin to become part of her. Some have to be almost like mist, others more distinct — never fully defined, but finding their way into her.

03. AND THEN THE OTHERS ARRIVE.

I begin working on the light. It has to be unmistakable — almost like destiny. Warm, bright, carrying hope. It will change the figures.

04. THE LIGHT HAS TO BE CLEAR.

I change her hairstyle and give her a classic bun. At first glance, it looks orderly. But look closer: it twists and winds around itself. Much better. Personality may look coherent from the outside while remaining complicated, layered and constantly changing.

05. EVEN THE HAIR WAS TOO SIMPLE.

The figures overlap. Colours mix. Boundaries disappear. What came from others is already becoming part of her. And this is where it gets uncomfortable: how much of what she thinks, wants and chooses is actually hers?