Artwork

Lost in isolation

2021 Competition entry

Detail
Tags

Elmeri Steyn

Details:
Signed
Mixed media, ceramic, wood
130 x 130 x 650 mm
R4 500
Description:
One of the feelings millions of us are experiencing during the current coronavirus pandemic is loneliness. In our combined efforts to stay safe and save lives, our usual ways of seeing family, friends, or just familiar faces have been put on pause. Isolation and loneliness are related concepts and often coexist. Loneliness can lead to isolation, and vice versa.

Although necessary to limit the spread of the pandemic, in fact, human beings are not “designed” to manage segregation for a long time. As the Greek philosopher Aristotle reminds us, man is a “social animal,” unable to live isolated from others, since the absence of relationships removes essential conditions for the development of personal identity and the exercise of reason. Although our first instinct may be to react angrily at people who pour out onto the streets, there is a need for a more universal compassionate stance – and recognition that the very nature of the human being is in stark contrast with the situation we are experiencing. Spending less time with family and friends has led to more feelings of loneliness than usual for lots of us– particularly for those who have been isolating.

We have made fortresses of our houses and personal space. Keeping everyone at bay, viewing, friends, family, and strangers with fear and suspicion. The doorbell only rings for all kinds of online deliveries or when we are reminded of the curfew and that we are controlled by regulations. We hide away in our houses, peeping outside to see the world going by and having no part in it.

Mixed media Ceramic Wood

Detail
Tags

Elmeri Steyn

Details:
Signed
Mixed media, ceramic, wood
130 x 130 x 650 mm
R4 500

Description:
One of the feelings millions of us are experiencing during the current coronavirus pandemic is loneliness. In our combined efforts to stay safe and save lives, our usual ways of seeing family, friends, or just familiar faces have been put on pause. Isolation and loneliness are related concepts and often coexist. Loneliness can lead to isolation, and vice versa.

Although necessary to limit the spread of the pandemic, in fact, human beings are not “designed” to manage segregation for a long time. As the Greek philosopher Aristotle reminds us, man is a “social animal,” unable to live isolated from others, since the absence of relationships removes essential conditions for the development of personal identity and the exercise of reason. Although our first instinct may be to react angrily at people who pour out onto the streets, there is a need for a more universal compassionate stance – and recognition that the very nature of the human being is in stark contrast with the situation we are experiencing. Spending less time with family and friends has led to more feelings of loneliness than usual for lots of us– particularly for those who have been isolating.

We have made fortresses of our houses and personal space. Keeping everyone at bay, viewing, friends, family, and strangers with fear and suspicion. The doorbell only rings for all kinds of online deliveries or when we are reminded of the curfew and that we are controlled by regulations. We hide away in our houses, peeping outside to see the world going by and having no part in it.

Mixed media Ceramic Wood