Afterlife, 2022

Acrylic and oil on canvas, textiles, wire, wood

The work has no fixed dimensions (the work consists of parts of different sizes)

“Afterlife” is a painting installation consisting of four paintings to fictitiously document the part of the process to overcoming, the aftermath of a traumatic event: a time in which the loss and suffering have transformed into experience and the new birth of a new beginning is possible.

The beginning is not a blank plane, but an underpainted surface upon which some-thing is to come. A painting with a contaminated, yet receptive surface, that seamlessly blends the strata of different ages. A freshly whitewashed area is not perfect, as if of palimpsest. The covered bumps are visible; the ruins of a self-image and basic beliefs, laments and pieced together pictures. New opportunities and relationships await to be applied and that which haunts requires understanding. The process itself is not smooth nor painless: each scratch on the surface is possibly a memory of something I once saw but did not notice, a trigger to memories and fears but also the possibility for dreams. every dash on the surface can be a reminder of something I never saw but did not notice; a trigger for memories, fears but also an opportunity for dreams.

“Afterlife was first exhibited at the graduation show TASE 2022 at ARS Project space.