memories archive, triptych | 2020

acrylics, gold leaf, ink on canvas

One of the artworks features a quote from Nausea by Jean-Paul Sartre – a book that had a very impactful influence on me in my teenage years.

“For a hundred dead stories there still remain one or two living ones. I evoke these with caution, occasionally, not too often, for fear of wearing them out, I fish one out, again I see the scenery, the characters, the attitudes. I stop suddenly: there is a flaw, I have seen a word pierce through the web of sensations. I suppose that this word will soon take the place of several images I love. I must stop quickly and think of something else; I don't want to tire my memories. In vain; the next time I evoke them a good part will be congealed.”

This reference is made in response to a concept in neuroscience, which illuminates that every time we recall a memory, our brain transforms and distorts it.

Can we then associate our memories with pure fantasy?

This triptych is inviting viewers to contemplate the nature of their own memories and the intertwining of reality and imagination – an intricate tapestry of emotions and perception, fluidity of recollections and the transformative power of time.

The central theme revolves around human nostalgia that can sometimes lead us to linger in the past, while reminiscing about these beautiful but already gone days. All the previous experiences indeed have to be appreciated as they form who we are today, but yearning for the past inevitably prevents us from being in the present moment

while ‘now’ is actually all we have — the past and future do not actually exist