O A S E S

OASES consists of 20 small wallmounted objects placed above 4 meters in length of artificial grass. The objects are made of recycled and altered plastic dolls and various pressed flowers and leaves, arranged and cast in transparent epoxy resin. This body of work was created in repetitive stages from mid-March 2020 to its completion in early 2021. The stages consist of growing, nurturing, and gathering plants in all seasons, selecting, drying, and pressing the plants for longer amounts of time, reworking anew the old plastic dolls, organizing and positioning the elements in molds, casting with epoxy resin, followed by setting period, and finally polishing the finished objects by hand several times. These are then laid out asymmetrically in a loose group, each of them softly suggesting its own curated narrative. With almost a magical-like presence, the oases captivate the viewer to experience them up close, for which one has to walk across the artificial grass. An attempt is made where the semantics are taken off the plants and flowers in order to enable the formation of a different nature relationship optic. They stand ambiguously among ambiguously faceless portraits offering an opportunity for the viewer to insert themselves. As time capsules they evoke and try to re-establish the strained link between humans and plants, culture and nature, the real and unreal, matter and thought, the personal and interpersonal.