Reservoir I, II and III

Abstract

These artworks are images of witnessing transient life and speak of our incredible ability of finding beauty in the moment, even during profound trauma. When completely at a loss for words, intense observation becomes a meditation. The artist quietly started to document medical fluid containers and focussed on the way light transformed things into subliminal abstractions. On contemplating familiar drips and dialysis bags, three individual works, titled “Reservoir I-III” (2019-2020) crystallised. In the three artworks, the word “reservoir” connected ideas of storage and of fluid being released; of containing a reserve for a time of dire need. The works include references to measurement but the data visually dissolves through the liquid bodies and stacked cellulose acetate. These cropped images capture life-providing tools, not as medical objects but as lenses becoming agents of transformation. Both metaphorically and visually, reality is altered.

The abstraction became an attempt to think through gradually unfolding meaning of our finite existence in a time of trauma. The artist contemplated questions raised by the author Yuval Harari (2018) about the relationship between new technologies and the ailing body, as the interpretation of data from monitors dictates the medical carer's decisions. In this century our mortal existence comes to be concluded being connected to plastic tubes. Harari’s questioning of ethics in twenty-first century found meaning in a time when personal loss and worldwide anxiety overlapped.