TEODORA IONESCU
visual artist
paperart installation, supported by Kunstenlab,Mondrian Fonds and Gemeente Deventer
The lockdown, with a the extreme feelings we all felt, was a return to my creative cocoon for me and probably for many other artists. Despite of the fact that I was ” locked”, the studio became a place without borders.
I focused on drawing discipline, looking for an in-depth layer, one beyond the traditional techniques. Working with different media I started experimenting with drawing a shape, without using the usual drawing tools. That’’s how I discovered the beauty of the paper cut technique, a different way for me to draw in space, directly with paper itself.
Step by step, my studio wall became the support for the paper roots. Slowly those elements invaded my space growing on the walls every day. During the day, the paper roots came to life through the spontaneous play of shadows created by the sunlight.
Driven by the desire to be in nature and to break through the closed space into which social isolation pushed us, I designed the first papercut installation “Roots are growing out of my walls 01”.
My proposal was for the “Kunsthalte” a glass container placed on the station square in Deventer. A large version of my initial idea.
“Roots are growing out of my walls 01” it’s a poetic vision of the nature that invades a space, grows and adapts. The step that nature took forward, while we humans retreated.
During the day, the frozen aspect of the artwork is slowly animated by the random appearance of shadows created by the natural light. This comes even more to life with the nightfall when a specially designed light installation that reacts to sound takes control and creates moving shadows. As the shadows start to move, the passing of time becomes sensible.
The installation can be seen from all sides, giving the viewer a new perspective each time. From afar, the viewer sees an enormous glass cell, invaded by an organic structure. The closer he gets to the container, the more the organic structure comes.
Kunsthalte,Kunstenlab 2022