STATEMENT

To make artwork is for me a way of giving a visual form to situations or stories I found to be poignant in the fleeting moments of my experience. 

Through the creative process I am maintaining an inquisitive attitude regarding past or present events and situations. This may feel unsettling sometimes, but it makes me aware of the context and helps me communicate it to the viewer. It is also a way of making visible and therefore sharing with the others the poetical potential of a certain situation, using images and words. My inspiration comes mainly from looking at old art or craft.  Most of the time I am making artwork in order to tell untold small stories, or to describe situations and mental states that are coloring our lives in their unfolding.  

My work alternates between creating abstract images and creating or using realistic representations of natural elements, most of the time exploring old images in new ways. It reflects on the themes of organic growth and decay, stillness and restlessness, interruptions and continuity.  Mindfulness, impermanence and interdependence are some of the central concepts I am working with.

In the last ten years I have been drawing or creating textile pieces. The drawings were usually watercolors or inks and acrylic. The textiles were soft sculptures or embroideries. The embroideries are collages of old and new images, many times stitched on vintage fabrics, combining found old fragments of materials with new ones. Most of the time, the works are presented in series or as small installations ordered around fragments of my poetry. My work takes as a reference the works of such artists as Louise Bourgeoise, Edmund de Waal, and Willemien de Villiers. It also includes and integrates elements from different traditions, such as those of parts of India, Tibet, Mexic and Romania – sometimes borrowing, re-interpreting and re-contextualizing ideas, visual fragments, symbolic signs or techniques. The results are eclectic cultural objects or images that give the viewer a mixture of a familiarity with unsettling feelings.

I do not feel I can change people or even less the world at large - I am too aware of our fleeting condition on Earth and do not claim that I know better than others which direction they ought to go. But, if my works had any potential for change, I would want them to make people slow down, reflect on what is meaningful for them, what they really need or want as humans in relation with nature as our home, not as a commodity, make them more humble and honest in relation to our shared human condition, therefore striving for peace.