Playing Around
In the posts above or below, there are photographic images of clay and a wooden anatomy study figure wrapped in a silk handkerchief. The works are in a continuous state of progression. They will continue even after this exhibit ends. Just like how eventually we will move on from this world event.
Since I went back to my home country when the Coronavirus struck the Netherlands, I lost physical access to the School. In an effort to continue to create, I thought to myself rather than think of creating work as working, I would think of it as playing. This was to stop myself from disliking something I liked to do.
Feeling myself generate anxiety and uncertainty I thought that it would be less scary for me if I tried to use that anxious energy into creating and thus, came to me an idea of a project, making things that I found fun in playing with. Feeling no pressure to create a great work, but to continue working in some form.
As I was dealing with anxious feelings related to not being in control, I wanted to work with things that I could touch and manipulate. Pull, push, squash, tear, rip, wrap, scratch and more. Being in control of clay let me have an area of control in my life. The same applies with the anatomy doll. Having something tactile was also meditative and enjoyable. It gave me a space to focus only on what was in my hands and nothing else. An opportunity to be distracted from what was going on in the world.
The Solar panels that you see on the exhibition site is directly related to this idea of turning one source of energy into another. I think that having a renewable source of energy during difficult times is something that we as a human species have a specialty in.
Enjoy.
Anna Kamper
P.S. To return to the exhibition here is the link