Viewfinder diaries project
Emma Willemse
Viewfinder diaries
2020 ongoing
Artist statement
As a conceptual artist, I am working with the concept of loss in a variety of mediums, including installations, painting, artist’s books and printmaking. Since the 1990’s the main focus of my work had been the notion of displacement, the loss of a home. Recently my interest shifted to the various losses occurring in the challenging times related to Covid-19.
The seed of the ideas for the Viewfinder diaries was planted during the hard lockdown in 2020, when I had to generate ideas in my own studio with whatever means I had at my disposal. I used the time to populate my idea board with images cut from popular media, snippets of old artworks, fragments of discarded drawings and prints, small objects and fabrics.
My idea board in May 2020
A cut-out template (a product from a previous work), served as a viewfinder to frame and detect visual relationships of these pinned down collages. I collected a vast number of viewfinder images, which were photographed, arranged and digitally manipulated into narrative formats. In each work in the series, four images are combined to tell a story, augmented by a text that I wrote – evoking a kind of diary of events of the year 2020.
The cut-out viewfinder unwittingly resembles a face mask, which ironically, as implied in this series, becomes the viewer to our outside world, as well as the gateway to the personal and often painful experiences suggested by the text narrative.
The project is ongoing. As I collect various images and re-arrange my idea board, I am adding more viewfinder diaries, accompanied by text that suggest my response to events in the world - these are often horrifying, painful or traumatic occurrences that I have no control over.
