TRONKVOËL Brunn Kramer Solo Exhibition
RK Contemporary Riebeek Kasteel 08 - 29 August 2021 Story Catherine Pate
Above: Die afwassing van sondes, 2021, candele soot (mixed media) on Fabriano, 104x150cm Opposite page: Die uitstorting vd heilge gees, 2021, candle soot (mixed media) on Fabriano 150x104cm
“Tronkvoel: Visual reflections on the use of prison as a metaphor for depression” Depression is as old as the human race, and rare is the person who has not felt its touch. Sometimes, suddenly, without apparent reason we feel unbearably sad. The world turns grey, and we taste a bitterness in our mouth. We hear an echo of the bell that tolls our passing, and we reach out for a comforting hand, but find ourselves alone. For some of us this experience is no more than a fleeting moment, or something we can dispel with common sense, thoughts and practical actions. But for some of us this experience becomes a ghost whose unbidden presence mars every feast, or worse, a prison whose walls, though invisible, are quite impenetrable… (Dorothy Rowe, 2013).
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My diagnosis of Major Depressive Disorder in 2018 led to my experience of a terrible loneliness and a peculiar isolation that triggered a feeling of imprisonment. The work thus engages with the idea of prison as a metaphor for depression and developed out of earlier work that centred around prisons and ex-prisoners. I explore the intersection of gender-based issues, homophobia, racism, and religious prejudice that is based on my experiences and identities, in an attempt to understand the depression and communicate the complex prejudices I face in my daily life. The work is based on my lived experience, through which depression can feel like a self-constructed prison. Thus, by visually communicating my lived experiences with depression as a coloured, queer body, I also aim to shed new light on society’s perspectives on mental health-related illnesses, as this too is often seen as taboo particularly in communities of colour.
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