cycles

Object: Wall installation / Dimensions: 1900x400 cm / Year: 2022

Cycles is the winning project of an open call for the conception and the achievement of a work of art in the visit hall of Luxembourg’s new prison, Centre Pénitentiaire Uerschterhaff (CPU).

Central to the creative reflection was finding an approach to change the way we usually look at prison and offering a different perspective. For this project it was important to create a discourse, develop a concept, and establish an idea that everyone would be able to perceive on the same level, be they inmates, prison staff, visitors, or those on the other side of the wall. In other words, to look for a link that connect us as human beings, as inhabitants of this planet

Every being, like everything in nature, is governed by time and natural cycles: circadian rhythms, night and day, seasons, lunar and planetary phases, hormonal cycles… Each of our molecules is influenced by the temperature, the dryness or humidity of the air, the wind, heavy rainfalls. In every aspect, at any given time, we are affected by different cycles. It is for example the carbon cycle (photosynthesis) that allows us to breathe – and we do so in the same way, anywhere on this planet. The way various cycles regulate our existence and the environment is often captured and explained through educational diagrams. In this installation, it was important to reinterpret such charts using a less formal and less didactic visual language. The aim was to create a harmonious composition illustrating the perpetually evolving sequence of life and nature. To introduce an additional natural element in the intended space the final visual elements were printed directly on raw wooden panels, mounted on the walls. This procedure made it possible to partition the drawings and to incorporate wood as a natural, warm, and living material in the Uerschterhaff prison’s visit hall.