Esmée
Bruins
Esmée Bruins
Project view
Artist Statement
My practice unfolds as an inventory—an ongoing, shifting archive that mirrors the contents of a home. This inventory does not simply catalogue objects or materials; it holds memory, absence, and the echoes of inherited silence. Emerging from a history of displacement and war, the work navigates the intersection between past, present, and future, often through what is unsaid or unseen.
Materials and media are not bound by their traditional roles. A photograph becomes a painting, and an installation becomes a stack. By destabilising form and genre, I resist fixed readings and question the constructs of authenticity, identity, and authorship. The instability between categories is intentional—it is a method that mirrors the instability of belonging and the layered experience of exile.
Central to the work is a visual and conceptual play between presence and absence, informed by the language of photography but extending beyond it. Containment, isolation, and rhythm emerge as recurring motifs, offering a quiet logic of absence that underpins the practice. Through this, I aim to open a critical dialogue around visibility, memory, and the spaces in between.
Materials and media are not bound by their traditional roles. A photograph becomes a painting, and an installation becomes a stack. By destabilising form and genre, I resist fixed readings and question the constructs of authenticity, identity, and authorship. The instability between categories is intentional—it is a method that mirrors the instability of belonging and the layered experience of exile.
Central to the work is a visual and conceptual play between presence and absence, informed by the language of photography but extending beyond it. Containment, isolation, and rhythm emerge as recurring motifs, offering a quiet logic of absence that underpins the practice. Through this, I aim to open a critical dialogue around visibility, memory, and the spaces in between.
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