THE MOURNERS (10 FIGURINES OF GRIEF)
Villa Arson Residency, Nice — 2023
Villa du Lavoir Residency, Paris — 2024
With the support of the Institut Français
Villa du Lavoir Residency, Paris — 2024
With the support of the Institut Français
Dead Sea salt, sea salt (Camargue), Prussian blue pigment, red ochre, copper pigments, water, pelite, wax and beeswax, fire and time, on aluminium or copper
Research initiated during the residency at Villa Arson, Nice (2023), with the support of the Institut Français, and continued during the residency at Villa du Lavoir, Paris (2024).
This project marks the beginning of my research into salt and the active processes of transformation of matter. It forms part of a wider research into the Pleiades, a cluster of stars often associated with mourners and guides through passages between worlds.
Each figurine is dedicated to a person who has passed away or to a community marked by mourning. Salt, pigments and earth are sealed beneath wax in a gesture of symbolic burial. The figure of Lot’s wife accompanies this research: that of a body frozen by loss, to which the living process of matter attempts to restore movement. Gradually, crystals emerge, transforming mourning into a living process.
