Migrating Identity
My personal history and the stories of people with similar experiences have inspired my degree project. It revolves around the feeling of belonging when moving from one place to another, longing for what is left behind, adapting to the new culture, new language and yet staying somewhere in between. It is about the notion of home in times of transition. The concept of home which is not grounded in a particular place or person, but is rather flexible, transportable and constantly changing. It has many different forms, but the emotional core is always the same.
I want to capture the ideas of places and identity transformation through materiality. The tree is a human-like living material, used in my work as a metaphor. It has both sides: rooted in the ground, but as wood it is can be transported anywhere. By bending it I place it alongside the human ability to adapt, paradoxically flexibility and solidity coming together in this new form, new identity construction.
The challenging circumstances of the pandemic situation raise more awareness for the topic of migration. Lack of human contact, limitations in global transport make us rethink our “normal”, revalue what we take for granted.
In the smaller scaled pieces, I delve into the materials and peoples migration, I reflect on my empathy towards the material and its’ origin.
“There is a connection with people, with environment, with cosmos and ideas.” ( Gunvorn Guttorm, 2017 )
I use jewellery as a method: it is a small portable vessel that people carry with them, it encapsulates the memories of places and people.
What stays behind when someone is gone or something is taken away?
My personal history and the stories of people with similar experiences have inspired my degree project. It revolves around the feeling of belonging when moving from one place to another, longing for what is left behind, adapting to the new culture, new language and yet staying somewhere in between. It is about the notion of home in times of transition. The concept of home which is not grounded in a particular place or person, but is rather flexible, transportable and constantly changing. It has many different forms, but the emotional core is always the same.
I want to capture the ideas of places and identity transformation through materiality. The tree is a human-like living material, used in my work as a metaphor. It has both sides: rooted in the ground, but as wood it is can be transported anywhere. By bending it I place it alongside the human ability to adapt, paradoxically flexibility and solidity coming together in this new form, new identity construction.
The challenging circumstances of the pandemic situation raise more awareness for the topic of migration. Lack of human contact, limitations in global transport make us rethink our “normal”, revalue what we take for granted.
In the smaller scaled pieces, I delve into the materials and peoples migration, I reflect on my empathy towards the material and its’ origin.
“There is a connection with people, with environment, with cosmos and ideas.” ( Gunvorn Guttorm, 2017 )
I use jewellery as a method: it is a small portable vessel that people carry with them, it encapsulates the memories of places and people.
What stays behind when someone is gone or something is taken away?
I invite a dancer to interact with my sculpures. The sculpture and the dancer became an extension of each other, they guide and follow each other's moves, there is a dialogue between them. It becomes a discussion piece about the fitting and adaptation in the new environment or the institutional structure. The need for trust and empathy when discovering new and unfamiliar things, something which puts us in an uncomfortable position or situation and we need to change not only our "body posture" but our way of thinking as well.
This collaboration becomes not only a dialog between the sculpture and the performer but also a metaphor for our lives us as artists, ex-pats, people who experienced similar patterns in life, including migration.
Movie made in colloboration with the dancer Yari Stilo. ( by Andres Gallardo)
This collaboration becomes not only a dialog between the sculpture and the performer but also a metaphor for our lives us as artists, ex-pats, people who experienced similar patterns in life, including migration.
Movie made in colloboration with the dancer Yari Stilo. ( by Andres Gallardo)
Movie from the exam exhibition at Konstfack (by Jonas Lythell )