The Density of Small Things

On Spaces Between, Transformation and Material

My work often begins before I even think of an image.

Sometimes my gaze lingers on a broken edge, the way a
fibre runs, or the small shadow a leaf casts on the ground.
Then I keep looking.

When I look at a stone, I wonder how long it took to take
on this form. What I see is only a moment in a much
longer process of change.

It is rarely the large things that draw me first. More often, it
is something the eye might easily pass over — a trace at the
edge or the distance between two forms.

When I keep looking, nothing seems simply to be there. A
surface can suggest what has acted upon it. Much of what I
see then seems to be as it is only for a while.

I have been looking this way for a long time.

In my early sketches, the object was often only the
beginning. I was more interested in what happened around
it: how two forms affected one another and how an area
changed as soon as something appeared within it.

Empty space was never truly empty to me.

A form does not end at its contour. It casts a shadow,
obscures something or alters the space around it. The area
left open is no longer the same afterwards.

At the time, I probably could not have put it this way. I
only knew that I was drawn to these spaces between. Today
I can see that they still appear in my work.

Later I realised that something similar held my attention in
poetry and music.

Over time, I began to pay closer attention to how
something comes into being, changes and continues to
have an effect.

What the Earth Keeps
In one of my poems, I tried to come closer to this thought:

Darkness fades
Light dies away

Form falls apart

Ash gives back
what the earth has kept

Nothing returns
as it was

When I read these lines, I do not think only of art.

No form remains as it is forever. Some things change
suddenly; others so slowly that I hardly notice. What
changes never becomes exactly what it was before.

Ash gives something back, but it restores nothing. The
earth receives what returns to it and transforms it.

For me, then, the earth holds something like memory. It
keeps nothing as it was, yet what loses its form can
continue to have an effect—as matter, trace or memory.

We, too, are part of this change. Our bodies are made of
the same substances as the world around us. Encounters
with people, places and things do not leave us entirely
unchanged.

Some of this can be seen in my images: in broken edges
and fading areas. I am interested in the moment when a
form is just becoming visible or is already beginning to
dissolve.

For me, a note draws life from what came before it and
from the silence that follows. In an image, the paper left
bare carries something of that silence. It leaves room for
light and stillness.

Sometimes an image gains density precisely when very little
happens in it.

Only later did I realise that this way of seeing extended
beyond my work.

Perhaps that was one of the reasons I studied geography.
From early on, I was interested in more than how a place
looked. I wanted to understand why something lay, stood
or grew exactly where it did, and how it had come to be
that way. I was also interested in how it affected its
surroundings.

During my studies, I learned to look even more closely.
Soil, water and climate could not be separated from one
another. Landscapes were shaped by both geological
processes and human intervention. The longer I studied a
place, the more connections became apparent.

Not in Isolation
When I look at a tree, I rarely see just the tree.

I think of the soil its roots lie in, the water it absorbs, and
the light its leaves turn towards. Fungi, animals and the air
around it are also part of its life.

The tree, in turn, shapes its surroundings. It provides
shade, keeps the soil moist for longer and itself becomes a
place for other forms of life.

A leaf absorbs light. Later, it falls to the ground, loses its
form and becomes part of the soil from which something
else can grow.

Even a stone changes—only so slowly that we hardly
notice. Water, pressure, heat and cold are at work on it.
Because we cannot see this happening, it seems
unchanging.

Yet even a stone is only this particular stone for a while.

I am moved by how much one thing depends on another.
Not all of this is peaceful. There is protection and mutual
support, but also disease, predation, displacement and
death.

A storm can destroy in a few hours what has taken years to
grow. Later, something else may grow in the same soil, but
new growth does not undo the loss.

And yet, sometimes there is something I could almost call
perfection. I do not mean a flawless order. I marvel at how
much is interconnected, even though I understand only a
small part of it.

The more closely I look, the more clearly I realise how little
I can grasp. For me, there is a sense of awe in that.

I am not thinking only of animals and plants. Light alters
surfaces, water finds its way, and traces of pressure and
time remain in the rock. Fire dissolves forms and changes a
place.

Much of this happens without us, and yet we live in the
midst of it. We affect it and are ourselves shaped by it.

Later, I encountered texts and traditions that sharpened my
way of seeing and helped me find clearer words for some
of it.

In Robin Wall Kimmerer’s Braiding Sweetgrass, I came across
the Haudenosaunee Thanksgiving Address. In it, thanks are
given not only to people but also to the earth, water, plants,
animals, trees and winds. I am moved that human beings
are not seen in isolation but as part of something larger.

Shinto traditions have broadened my perspective in a
different way. Kami can be associated with mountains,
rocks, trees or waterfalls. Some of these places are revered
as places where kami dwell. In this, I find a way of looking
at the world not only from a human point of view.

I did not grow up with these traditions. I approach them as
a learner.

Encountering them made it clearer to me that my attention
does not stop with human beings.

At the Worktable
At the worktable, I look first at the paper.

Each sheet has a tension of its own. Its fibres and
absorbency help determine how the ink behaves on it.
Even two sheets of the same type of paper can behave
slightly differently.

I put down a line and wait a moment. The ink sinks into
the paper, gathers at an edge or spreads farther than
expected. Elsewhere, the paper holds it back.

The sheet expands and slowly begins to buckle, while the
mark continues to change as it dries.

I begin with an idea. Once the ink is on the paper, I have to
look again. I may continue the line in a different way,
remove some water or simply leave an area alone.

At first, some things seem to have gone wrong: an area that
has become too dark, a broken line or an edge that runs
differently from what I had planned.

I do not leave everything as it is. But sometimes, in a place
like that, I discover something I had not seen before.

As I work, I ask myself whether anything is really still
missing from the image or whether I am continuing only
because I feel uncertain.

I often find it easier to add something than to stop.
Even after I have stopped, light continues to work on the
image. Light areas reflect it; black areas absorb it. Over
time, light changes the surface itself.

With Few Means
Most of the time, I work with black and white. A single line
or a single area can be enough, while much remains
untouched.

One more stroke can disturb the stillness of an image.
What had seemed open only a moment before can
suddenly feel too heavy or too closed. Sometimes the very
line I expect so much from has almost no effect.

After making an image that has become too pleasing, I
become more cautious. If one area has overwhelmed
everything else, I look for more space in the next work.
Sometimes it is only through an unsuccessful image that I
understand what I was actually looking for.

In a small trace, water, pigment, paper, pressure and time
come together. I cannot show everything that happens
there. I probably do not want to.

A dark area can hold the eye for a long time. Beside it, the
untouched paper stands out more clearly.

The empty space has to carry its weight as well.
When I leave something out, I see the image differently. An
edge becomes clearer, a trace emerges, and light falls
differently on the paper.

There is little sign of landscape in my images. I find nature
instead in the way the material behaves: in how ink flows or
stalls, and how a form grows denser or begins to dissolve
again.

When I write, I pay attention to something similar: the
space between words. Some things become tangible
precisely where I leave them partly unspoken.

Perhaps that is why I keep returning to What the Earth Keeps.