the Ice Prisoner
(p)Art Team
- Puk: idea, photography, soundscape arrangement
- Patrick Bruggeman: text
- Carmella Borgh: soundscape arrangement
- Thijs van Wijck: voice
- Ester Rademaker: wooden installation
The artist was baffled to hear people say that refugees were not welcome in the Netherlands. She has travelled a lot and lived abroad simply because she was curious about different countries and cultures. She didn’t need to… she was perfectly safe in the Netherlands.
She thought about it and questioned herself: “I am allowed to emigrate, but one is not allowed to escape the horrors of his or her country. Do people realise the hypocrisy, the injustice of the cold and negative attitude towards refugees?”
An other subject that shook her, was child abuse. In a small village in the Netherlands children were abused for years. When a couple of villagers were interviewed they said: “We’ve always been suspicious…”
The artist remembered someone saying that it doesn’t only take a village to raise a child, it also takes a village to abuse a child* . Imagine to be one of the abused children, now an adult hearing someone say “we’ve always been suspicious…”. If you were suspicious about horrible things being done to children, how is it possible to remain passive and not undertake any form of action? *Quote from Boston lawyer Mitchell Garabedian who represents victims and survivors of sexual abuse: “If it takes a village to raise a child, it takes a village to abuse one “
These and other incidences and subjects made the artist think about the ‘why’. Religion has a strange hold on us, even nowadays when most people in the Netherlands hardly practice their religion and more and more people are atheists. The effect or imprint of a government and or church will probably linger on for years to come. We need to learn to think for ourselves, even when you are a religious person: pause and think a moment about the impact on others.
De IJsgevangene or Ice Prisoner is a multi disciplinary art installation. The installation challenges the audience to think about our personal view, thoughts and feelings towards others.
The installation creates a space (room) to take a moment to think, feel and be confronted.
The FP-100C polaroids were used to take the photographs and were peeled and frozen. After being completely frozen, they were photographed again. The photographs were printed on glass and placed into the installation.