Pages of books and old maps as thin and delicate tentacles coming out from the rigid book covers abandoned. The books make the roots, not only (and especially) in the heart of the most passionate reader, But even as they pass through the hands of South African sculptor Barbara Wildenboer.
From covers of old scientific books, of disused atlases made from old time, Wildenboer manages to squeeze out words and thin strips of paper as the roots of a tree or a complex nervous system or almost prehistoric marine microorganisms.
The project is called Library of the Infinitesimally Small and Unimaginably Large and is started in 2011.
The collection consists of old books, maps and atlases which become the raw material and reference for sculptures, paper installations and digital animation.
The books themselves as phrases, words and letters become elements of a new visual storytelling in which old and new coexist in narrative forms. All works of this collection have the name of the book from which her artistic exploration starts.
The artist focuses on nature and makes the main subject, as do many artists, because reflects on environmental issues that increasingly plague our world.
It is also a testament the project named Canaries in the Coalmine where the main subject are birds long considered as indicators of environmental change and can essentially be seen as the “canaries in the coal mine” when it comes to climate change.
The idea refers to the practice used by miners to use a bird to detect leakage of poisonous gases such as methane in the long tunnels of mines.
Visit Barbara Wildenboer to see all her works.
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