Response to place | 2018

Response to Place | contemporary art vessels

These five contemporary art vessels from Severijns are viscerally crafted paper objects created as testimonies of living in a country of extremes, conflicts and disputes. As an artist, Severijns explores her personal journey of having been born in Holland and then at a later age moving and assimilating with her family into Israeli society. She has witnessed a complexity and absurdity of everyday life here on various levels: cultural, social, political, military, religious, etc. The rapid national shift to an (extremely) conservative Israeli government is a painful experience for Severijns as it conflicts with the ideals and values she pursues.  

Despite all this Israel is home to her! It is the place where she raised her three daughters from youngsters to adults. It is the place where Severijns developed herself as an artist. The enriching growth process as an artist could not have taken place without the experience of living in this new homeland. Most of her subject matter relates and responds to this place.

Unconsciously, Severijns’ most recent artworks are chosen objects that are closely related and connected to home: carpet, blanket and vessels. Never intended to be applied art objects, Severijns transforms these homely objects into contemporary art pieces full of metaphors and connotations.

In this series the contemporary art vessels mirror the complexity of living in Israel. She starts each vessel with the same shape made of coarse black paper pulp. Then she layers them with hand-torn pieces of paper that are a metaphor for the layers of complexity. She plays with the inner world – outer world. At first glance, the vessels appear to be attractive pieces of art. But at closer inspection, each vessel contains distorted elements. Severijns left holes, splits, cuts or total bareness as representations of the darker sides of living here. In some of the vessels she literally ripped off freshly applied paper pieces to create a resemblance of imperfection and disharmony.

In this contemporary art vessels series, Severijns demonstrates her artistic competence by innovatively enhancing the dexterity of paper; transforming and challenging old techniques; and experimenting with new creative processes.

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All image courtesy: Sigal Kolton