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Maori culture personifies nature.
The land is our mother, the sky our father,
and the trees are our siblings
and immediate ancestor.
We stand within nature.
I wanted to create a sense of this connection
with nature in the first works
visitors encounter in the Terpkerk
(Terp Church).
Above: Entrance to the church showing one of the snail forms in the work
Dans le jardin des beaux arts (In the garden of fine arts) and the bird-form, You never stand....
Left: One of 16 snail forms, (Dans le jardin des beaux arts on the steps of the Terpkerk.
Left: Two snail forms were also laid out to left of the inner doorway. The plinth on the right introduces these two works on the floor
(Dans le jardin des beaux arts and
You can never stand... )
as well as the soundscape for
An inland soul at sea.
First visitors encountered a snail on the steps and then the long-legged bird-form
bearing the text:
you can never stand
in the same shadow twice.
the shadow of the stork
on the surface of the water
More about this work >>
Above: Two of 16 snail forms, (Dans le jardin des
beaux arts in the entrance hall of the Terpkerk.
The text on the larger snail reads:
The tide was a million kilometres wide and its noise was like deafening thunder. It was a continuum of past, present, and future, filled with creatures of darkness and creatures of light which swam, divided, united and swam again."
The above text from the book, "The Dream Swimmer" by the New Zealand author,
Witi Ihimaera, conjures up magical worlds in various time-frames with nature at its centre.
This text was accompanied by the soundscape for An inland soul at sea.
Listen to 4 minutes of this
(at a low quality).
This soundscape incorporates music by Ben Koen & Joe Fiedler (from the "Reliance" cd) (U.S.A.), and by Brenda Liddiard and Mark Laurent (from their "Stations of the Cross" cd) (New Zealand).
The sounds were sea-like sounds, which evolved towards gentle drumming, saxophone droning, trumpet, piano and guitar rifts then, humming, and chanting.
Just inside the main space, hang 19 forms just above head height.
View the rest of this image (61 kb)
Left to right underneath: Between you and me (mask); A Tangled Tale; Found Objects (objects in deep frame); In You I Have Treasured... (lithograph and silkscreen print); Found Objects (lithograph and silkscreen print)
Details of An inland soul at sea,
an installation of hanging objects
and a soundscape, 2003.
Photo: Leo Klein, The Netherlands.
An inland soul at sea, a soundscape
of water-like sounds mixed with music by 4 musicians accompanied translucent boat-like forms, hanging above the viewer. While this work was a starting point - a moment for meditation - there is no particular viewing point. These boats forms can also be seen as suspended islands.
Further on are a collection of other 'islands', in the form of snails spread over the floor. Each snail bears text in either English, Dutch or New Zealand Maori alluding to changing times and perspectives, in nature, culture, and the arts.
Text on the smaller snail:
In the garden of Fine Arts.
Text on the larger snail:
The princess was given a ball of magic thread The princess received a magic a magic collection of threads and was told that she should pull out a thread whenever she was unhappy. When the thread come out, the unpleasant time would be over. Soon most of the threads were gone and the princess discovered that she had become an old woman."
Click on the small images on the left
to view larger views of each work.
View the Matua paintings.
Larger view (25 kb)
Text for the snail facing the chair above is: "Daag jij mij uit?" lachte de haas.
(translation of : "Challenge me?", laughed the hare.)
Larger view (34 kb)
A larger view of the snail on the left above
Larger view (48 kb)
> Larger view (58 kb)
The text reads: "De princes kreeg..."
(This is the Dutch translation of the The princess was given...
A workshop with a class of high school students.
Other workshops with the snails
I also gave three hour long workshops for primary school classes.
I put the students into groups of two or three and gave them questions to work out in response to the various works in the show.
Later each group gave a short presentation about what they discovered, what they decided in their consultation, and how they would change how that work could be presented.
The text cut into the metal reads:
Fain Would they put out God's light, but God only desireth the light
though the infidels abhour it.
On the left are five small transparent 'prism-like' house forms where sections from the text of the Parable of the Rich Fool from New Testament, are only visible if read through the roof of each house. From any other angle the houses appear empty.
Ablutions (Wassing),
projected from a computer onto a white cube placed in the center of the black plastic covered cabinet. There were viewing openings on three sides.
I reworked the Ablutions video so it would run on an old computer, hence the video was only about one minute long.
The prints above are listed below the next image.
Left to Right: We are One (lithograph); Ladies Touch Sevens (lithograph); He toa takitini taku toa, ehara i te toa takitahi (silkscreen print); He matua (silkscreen print); He mahi wahine (silkscreen print); Fertile (lithograph and silkscreen print); A Conscious Desire (silkscreen and lithograph) and Eve's Apple (silkscreen and lithograph.
Sonja with children from a primary school in the area.
Parking Spaces for Important Visitors (acrylic on wood fibre and waterproof vanish.
New Zealand birds represented (left to right): Ruru, Pukako, Piwawaka, Weka and the Kiwi.
June 23rd: Eleven and twelve year olds writing about Parking Spaces for Important Visitors.
June 23rd: Eleven and twelve year olds doing assignments about
the Parking Spaces for Important Visitors
(top right) and Terra Australis
Left wall: Virtue of the Rose (3 small box-like objects), Grains of Salt (diamond shaped box),
Eva was hier (green rectangular form), Dress it Up
Left to Right: Memorials (ceramic tiles on floor), Carrying a Message (light green print),
Between You and me (mask form), A tangled tale (more images of this are below) and far left, Found Objects.
June 23rd: Ten and Eleven year olds reading the text that is part of the work, Memorials. On the right is a detail of A Tangled Tale.
Left to Right: Between You and Me (mask)
A Tangled Tale
