Once upon a Time

Once Upon a Time

Happy memories exist within my childhood. Even though I was raised and brought up in a disadvantaged area in South Africa, my childhood was a time that I now long for, a time where things were simple whereas presently, I am faced with many challenges and responsibilities while rather wanting to be quite oblivious to the real world. I have therefore created an entire installation of my childhood through my all time favourite fairytales. My installation consists of three dimensional sculptures purely made out of paper. Together they create the perfect memory of my childhood and they symbolize that happy and imaginative time in my life.

Using paper to create my body of work relates to the past as paper is the holder of memories and history. However the paper I have used is blank on its surface, unlike the paper on which history and memories are written and drawn. The paper I have used, however contains and evokes its capacity to store and explore memories, firstly because of its intrinsic value and secondly through the forms which the paper has taken. The use of white in the installation not only represents innocence and purity in childhood but adds a sense of dreaminess to the work, similar to that of the haze of a memory. Through the fragile use of paper, I have not only used it to represent the fragility of a memory, but to evoke that magical quality that one could capture through paper.

Each piece has been realistically portrayed as if they could exist in the real world, making the installation more believable to the viewers. 

90% of the paper that I have used is recycled paper, which in turn makes all my sculptures recyclable. This adds to the ephemeral quality to my work, just like the way some of our memories lack permanence. This conceptually adds to the fragility of my body of work, which adds that much more magic and unpredictability.