be gentle with the edges of the world

some of summer 2010, captured mainly on analogue

Richard Wilson's 20:50 in the Saatchi Gallery, London

(source)

Ernesto Neto's Edges of the World in the Hayward Gallery, London

(source)

Dal Lake, Shrinagar

(digital)

On my way home, The Hague

Coffee with Nana and Veerle, The Hague

Biscuits baked for a boat trip with STEK, The Hague

Rockin' Park 2010, Nijmegen

Stereophonics, Rockin' Park 2010, Nijmegen

C is for COS, Copenhagen and Camping, the start of Nana/Sophie/Veerle's party

down by the water

The Hague, 2009, 2010 (analogue)

Things of note this week:

i. Holland 2, Brazil 1.

ii. Rockin' Park 2010 - Vampire Weekend, Pearl Jam, White Lies, Black Keys, Stereophonics, Amy Macdonald, Custom. and me.

iii. Nana, Veerle and Sophie's C-themed leaving party.

iv. Dusseldorf for a weekend of art coming up.

v. Seeing Jens (my coyear in Wales) and watching Holland - Slovakia in the KABK with a heap of artistic people and in Centraal Station with an eclectic bunch of folk.

he's nearing the brink but he thinks first the parallel universe perhaps could be the perfect scene.

A minor photo update of the year now past, whilst I gather my thoughts and self for the report of more recent times.

UWC-NL jaargroep 2009-2011 in the early days

Paud orientation (the first week in)

Second Years Show, theme: flamboyant tellytubby zombies (hence the laundry baskets)

First Exeat (long weekend) in Bombay, outside the Taj hotel

An inspired Art HL double block with Zuzana and some paint (masks painted by Zuzana and I, photography by Marius)

Travel week in Rajasthan, in March

A tea party in my courtyard for a belated birthday celebration

Leh, Ladakh, on a postgrad journey to the cold North

let's consider a change of scenery, it's getting boring by the sea

This is Ladakh, a region of Jammu-Kashmir, situated up in the Himalayas. I traveled up there after graduation before flying back over here. It was stunning.

To get up to the northern-most state of India, we got a jeep, plane, train, bus and then another jeep. It took us quite a couple of hours, with the inevitable adventures and tribulations that come along with traveling in India as teenagers. It was however most definitely worth it.

I will soon tell the tales of our travels, however for the time being, these are the most interesting things I've done post-India:

i. sat on the beach outside a Bon Jovi concert with friends I hadn't seen in six months, and then we saw a, unexpected, better live performer in a small pub in town afterwards.

ii. met the Prince of the Netherlands and my first years, who got to wear the orange polos and sing the cheesy sponsor-thanking songs on stage this year.

iii. started to volunteer for a charity working with refugees in the Hague, for which I met a bunch of lovely mothers and children displaced in the Netherlands.

iv. unpacked and slept. a lot.

As for the near future, I'm off to see Salman Rushdie talking about peace now, and have a UWC barbeque tomorrow. Next week equals grandparents, dropping by Utrecht and most probably more sleeping and listening to a lot of music.

I'll talk about India more, soon!

it would be a documentary on radio four.

Lists of numbers, lists of definitions, lists of formulae, lists of 'last times'.

Everything is starting to add, pile, stack up into a massive heap of things left to do, things never finished and things finite.

This is my 41st post here.

I'm a year down the road, I'm halfway through, I'd like to think I've grown somehow and my hair is longer.

(College meeting, sometime in December)

Having spent the past week drifting in and out of classrooms, studybooks, the cafeteria and the MPH (Multi-Purpose Hall, where the exams are held), I had to refer to the calender on my wall today to find the date and day we are currently living in.

Numbers, definitions, formulae, last times all come rushing in again.

It's been 361 days since my very first post, it's (again, a glance up at the calender is required) 4 days until Graduation, 5 days until we leave this place, a fortnight until I'm home and another two months before I come back out here.

Since we last spoke (or rather: I last monologued my way through a blogpost) UWC-day happened, American Cultural Evening occurred and we made our way through multiple student meetings, college meetings, deadlines and packing issues.

I'll be seeing most of you soon and will expand on this year when I've got more time!

x

a miniature recreation of the-north-pole-meets-my-mind

Having spent hours taping styrofoam to the floor, I proceeded to spend another couple of hours unsticking the whole thing. I thought the deconstruction remnants of the installation were actually just as interesting as the constructed whole, so here they are.

unmade beds #54 (stitching time)

This was my site specific installation for Art a couple of weeks back. The inspiration theme was 'Never', so I took it in the direction of never growing up or old. It evolved into a white room (white being symbolic for purity and clean slates) with skeleton flowers (these could also be seen as modern, futuristic ones, or as the remnants of a past).

The floor was half styrofoam and flour, half mattresses and scraps of (white) cloth. I wanted to create a space that stood outside of the space of time (this comes from the idea that arose from a discussion I had with a coyear here, about time being another form of space), that could be ageless, as it were. The mattresses and styrofoam were my attempts to landscape the floor, as I wanted the installation to be tactile and comfortable. The flour provided some element of movement in the room, as it changed when people walked over it. It also meant that people could not leave without taking some with them, tying in to the idea of memories and time forever interacting with the present and future.

The title comes from the idea of dreaming being a means through which one can escape what my English teacher calls 'the tyranny of time'. It also links to the saying 'a stitch in time saves nine', which is all about doing things well the first time around. Essentially, I was interested in creating a space through my art, rather than putting my art in a space, and about looking at the idea of time.

Any queries, comments or things in general? Email me or leave a comment :)