"I remember the warm shafts of light, brushing my skin and dipping the city into a tone of golden red and brown at the evening. Nobody recognises me here, I am a foreign existence which strolls around all the seven hills of the city, nowhere to be found."
Artist: Steven Natusch
Project: Asking for the Sun (2020) & What will be different Tomorrow? (2022)
One of our jury's favorite project, from the October 2023 opencall.
There is a longing that is unmatched. It got fulfilled at the same time as it got created, it’s asking me for the unfulfillable.
The feeling of Nostalgia crashes down upon me with an unpleasant force.
Until here, I have been someone, that bloomed the most in situations, which had a lack of familiarity, a lack of certainty. Being solitaire within such an environment, my emotional perception always was the strongest.
While strolling through the night, my stay here feels fragile but irretrievable at the same time. Every night as I come home, I already cling to future memories. To the present moments that are happening right now and become memories second after second, minute after minute.
There’s a constantly felt shiver, trying to catch the wind between my fingertips. I may never get back, this free unattached feeling of solitude. Being so stuck in the present, and lost to the past, feels as if one is continuously stumbling and then catches oneself again, shortly before falling, only to continue stumbling again.
I was here the whole time.
- Asking for the Sun (2020)
_______________________________________
The weight of war, pandemics, climate change, and the breakneck speed of technological advancements is palpable, casting an ominous shadow over the future. As I grapple with the meaning of my existence, life itself feels increasingly fragile and uncertain. One must ponder, can a human being truly exist without an identity, without content?
Nothingness, the negation of existence, has been the subject of contemplation for ages, pervading language, philosophy, and art. From this arises the possibility of either being everything or nothing at all. Within the environment of this concept, one quickly comes up against the limits of logical thinking and gets caught in paradoxes. But it is precisely this contradictoriness that creates the framework for expressing a relationship with the world that, like the term itself, is characterised by opposites. My work reflects a constant process of a search for importance within a transience of life which so far, remains uncertain.
The world may be in flux, but I find solace in catching a glimpse of what is likely not to be found.
- What will be different Tomorrow? (2022)
_______________________________________
© Steven Natusch