Still
Life - The small deception?
I take as a starting point the mundane, what we surround ourselves
with in everyday life that we may not notice and that we take for
granted.
Focusing on what exists at ground level, I perform a close reading
of nature and of human intervention in it.
Initially, my drawings may be read as beautiful nature studies or
still lifes, until the viewer notices that something is about to
happen or
has already occurred. The images often spring from a sense of unease
but also a small amount of humor. I draw standard signs and symbols,
filling them with landscapes or semi-recognizable organic materials
like in the works "Krans" and "Kors" (Wreath
and cross) where I take
familiar objects of grief and draw them back to their origin - nature.
The objects are created from growths from the forest. Here I explore
my
own private loss and sorrow by processing something everyone passes
through in life -balancing it finely between what may become introvert
lingering in own emotions, and that which concerns common topics.
Through the ritual that the drawing process is to me, from idea
to my
choice of objects and materials, to the time it takes, a healing
circle arises and my gaze redirects itself back out.
I
also take as a starting point the still life tradition's detailed
realism and hidden symbols, and the Greek tradition of trompe l'oeil
that imitates
nature, or mimesis, tha the Dutch painters also termed "bedriegertje"
- the little deception. Another central theme in the still life
tradition is "vanitas"
- a moral reminder of the transience of all things and the futility
of pleasure.
In the triptych "Fruit", a drawing study of a half-rotten
apple, I attempt to mend the fruit using good, old-fashioned embroidery.
I am concerned
with creating thought disturbances in our preconceptions and expectations
of what nature is and what is natural - and for whom?
We
equip ourselves with tools of interpretation such as theory, religion
or maps, in order to create meaning. But the world as interpreted
by theory
often differs from the world we experience physically and sensually.
This creates fault lines where a blind zone between interpreted
and
experienced reality arises. My works often exist in this blind zone.
Here, new rooms and contexts are opened that are less evident than
what
rational thinking may offer. Often, a surreal reality meets an intimate
reality. The close and intimate are challenged, and what we believe
to know changes character.
Perhaps,
in an absurd way I am trying to save the unsalvageable?
|