Would anyone agree with her, she wondered, if she were to say that focusing on being the best version of yourself at all times is… dull?
That it’s the flaws and the failures that make someone likeable — not how many steps you’ve walked today, how well you’ve monitored your sleep, or how few fatty acids you’ve eaten?
Gilda looked at the women around her in the room and thought: probably not.
She has a way of seeing through things. A grounded, old-fashioned common sense that feels increasingly rare in a world obsessed with optimisation, tracking, and constant self-improvement.
Gilda doesn’t go to the gym. Why would she, when she can go for long walks outdoors? Dance till she drops. Make love till she’s out of breath. Live.
There’s no soul in gyms. No space for thought. No room for intuition — just discipline for discipline’s sake. And all those sweaty bodies staring at their own reflections as if answers might suddenly appear there. It seems like...time wasted?
All these apps telling you to meditate more, sleep better, exercise harder, eat healthier — it's such a time-consuming effort to be more efficient! And to what use? Why obsess over how long you’re going to live if you’re too busy monitoring it to actually enjoy it?
Gilda follows hearts, not trends.
She drinks a little too much at times, yes. And she could probably do with a greener menu — but heck, she savours life. Indulges in it.
That philosophy is why Gilda became a tufted portrait.
Tufting is slow. Physical. Resistant to perfection. Every line is built thread by thread, demanding patience and presence. The texture carries weight — softness, irregularity, and somehow humanity and the process reminds me of her thinking. The wool holds space for imperfection without trying to correct it.
Gilda doesn’t strive to be impressive.
She doesn’t chase better, faster, cleaner versions of herself.
She simply insists on living.
And in a world obsessed with control, that makes her quietly radical.
Gilda — tufted portrait — is part of my ongoing exploration of people who resist polish, reject optimisation, and choose life over performance.