Four Walls
As immigrants to Australia, Annelize Mulder and Cielle Jansen van Vuuren explore the inevitable questions and longing that stems from leaving home in their exhibition, Four Walls. It becomes apparent that home is not contained within a building, it extends far beyond any conceivable space and time. Searching for a sense of belonging and trying to grasp hold of memories that are fading, the two artists explore the notion of home from different perspectives.
Objects are important in Annelize’s work. Family heirloom furniture are re-contextualized in a poetic manner. Focusing on the ability of objects to transcend space and time in an instant. Each object embodies a weight of memories ingrained through time. Questions surrounding the validity of objects as recollection triggers arise. The intrinsic weight of objects ground the human and assist in the growing roots, even if they are just temporary.
Cielle’s ephemeral quality in her translation of home suggests the search for the sacred and the sublime within the mundane of the everyday. Representing the domestic as personal perception and evoking an awareness of personal viewpoint. Human beings relive memories, especially of happiness. We search for our corner of the world, it can be anywhere and with anyone.
Home allows us to immerse into conversant memories and bask in the shelter it offers. The container filled with objects, people and the memories associated with them wraps us up in a space that is timeless. We are forever searching and recollecting. Paging back and forth through our book of life reading and dreaming of what had passed and hope for what comes next.