Your eyes fool around with your perception. Things aren’t always what they seem. Roos Breeuwerplays with this idea. She had a room, with an open entrance. By blocking the entrance, and leaving an open slit in the middle, she was able to play with our perception. In the room, she made a big poster made up of colour swatches supplied by Histor, a paint brand. Seen from a distance, it looks like a closed door with a colourful decoration. It’s not until you get closer that you realize there’s a space behind that you’re looking into. The view changes, your focus changes, you see more.
So why did she use color swatches for this installation? Roos had an assignment in the countryside. A double rainbow appeared in the sky. This inspired her. She became intrigued by rainbows, photographing them, and wrote a poem for her grandmother about rainbows. Rainbows aren’t really there. You see them, but you can’t touch them. You can’t get close. Rainbows are there because of how light travels though the rain showers. What you see isn’t always there, and that’s why it’s so important for Roos to get together and share perceptions. By sharing, you’ll find what is there. At the Rietveld Academy, sculpturing isn’t about making statues out of clay. There’s several branches, several people making sculptures in their own way with their own materials. But it’s not about the individual. It’s about the commonality. Bringing the differences in approach and perception together. To see what is really there.
Poem translation:
I draw a line
With an arch
With an angle
With a point
That line is time
Which is created and experienced together
The lined is colored
Surround by water and light
Like a path through the clouds
That we walk upon together
The colors of the past and the future
I draw a line with colors
With an arch
With an angle
With a point
To briefly ponder about
