Grace Schwindt
Falcon Hoods, 2017
Dimensions model 1: 8 cm height x 7 width x 7 depth (with top part); model 2: 8 cm height x 7 cm width x 8 cm depth
Materials: Porcelain, copper glaze
courtesy the artist and Zeno X Gallery, Antwerp (BE)
Steel Wings, 2017
Dimensions: 146 × 120 × 144 cm
Materials: Steel
courtesy the artist and Zeno X Gallery, Antwerp (BE)
Pierced Mermaid, 2017
Dimensions: 136 × 60 x 60 cm
Materials: Steel, fabric
courtesy the artist and Zeno X Gallery, Antwerp (BE)
In my work I draw on the fields of theatre, dance, film, sculpture and music. My methodology takes singular events, individuals, objects or stories as my point of departure. My process often originates from specific research and conversations with activists, politicians or family members.
Each work is part of an exploration of different media’s conventions of looking at the body within capitalist society, where each body has to function to produce capital and maintain the system efficiently. For me it is a key element in the looking and thinking about any system that plays a part in a given work. I do not want to represent something I do not believe in. Taking this thought further, every movement, every gesture, every word is not neutral but loaded with values and meanings that have been created throughout history. Therefore, as far as possible, I begin by trying to strip words and gestures of their values and meaning and to look at every element as material, as a thing in itself, for example a word, a body, a colour, walking, speaking. This does not mean that I believe neutrality exists and I also always use stories that are loaded with historical significance, for example a war.
When I think about how one negotiates living in a society governed by capitalism, I think of the ‘one’ as a body that can be hurt and that can die, quite easily die, through dangerous labour, through worries, through illness. When we cut, we bleed. Capitalist society is violent to the body and its violence reaches every cell. It seems very easy to forget that our bodies are vulnerable, they seem more abstract in capitalism and death seems not to exist – until it happens.
