YOU ARE SO I WAS STONE HEARTED is a work on the observation of the inner and outer worlds, consisting of an introspective graffiti text written on a triangular marble (waste) slab. It expresses the process of inner hardening and softening.
Acrylic paint on Carrara marble. Width 110 x height 45 cm x depth 3 cm, weight ca 50 kg.
The display of an inner dialogue written a stone tablet, reflecting on transformation. YOU ARE SO I WAS STONE HEARTED is the result of understanding oneself through the cleansing power of creation.
Before, there was this feeling of stone-heartedness, within the maker but also how the maker judged the outside world. Now looking backwards after multiple creations over time and - an inner dipping process of - observing and understanding even forgiving oneself and others, the heart is no longer in pain and harsh.
Therefore, the pink text (a loving, innocent, nourishing colour) I WAS is added over the text YOU ARE SO, symbolizing the current softer state of being.
Yet YOU ARE SO is still visible, for the past cannot be erased, though embraced.
At the same time, the work points to people who are still hardened. A tongue of cheek regarding the outside world and a former lover.
The lower left ‘S’ resembles a dollar sign on purpose. Money $ makes one, people and society in general, stone-hearted.
YOU ARE SO I WAS STONE HEARTED tags refinement - the polished marble stone - with raw imperfection. The text and the nasty written black dripping ‘weeping’ letters express the inner conversation and introspective analysis. It could have been spoken, or written on paper, now it was painted on a marble.
When the work is placed flat on the floor, one could perceive YOU ARE SO I WAS STONE HEARTED as a contemporary, self-reflective, memorial stone…