Diversion from domesticity (self-portrait with bassoon, etc.)
Acrylic and batik on paper
96,5 cm x 71,5 cm
Artist’s Statement
This work reflects an autobiographical engagement with dreams and diversion amid the domestic quotidian. It thematises the tension between interior and exterior spaces, both physical and psychological. The domestic setting represents comfort, but also confinement. Nature’s welcome “intrusion” into the home by means of mushrooms and over-sized blue waxbills, unsettles the ordinary and bridges the divide between reality and unreality. The work suggests fluidity between mental and physical states and acknowledges the power of thoughts and dreams in constructing or narrating personal experience. What is imagined is not subordinate to what is tangible in as much as it shapes a very real inner experience. The bassoon becomes a symbol of escape through enjoyment and, as a symbol of creativity and culture, offsets stereotypical images of feminine domesticity.
Gallery
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