Abberton, ViiVi (AUS, Tasmania),
Debilitation
DEBILITATION
Debilitation is about the pain I now live with due to my depression and chronic illnesses.
ARTIST STATEMENT
ViiVi Abberton
I take myself in the form of my body and adorn it with the effortless and the most grueling parts of my existence using textiles, ceramics and text.
Making sculptural art grounds me both in reality and my body. When I turn my feelings, thoughts and experiences into sculptures they aren't just representing these inspirations but they also represent my own physicality.
I am drawn to clothing and textiles because of how we as humans use them to connect and communicate with one another all over the world. I take a medium that is so familiar and cross the line between something we don't often think about to something that sparks thought and conversation.
The tactile nature of creating sculptures and wearable art with my hands feels like I'm recreating myself. They prove I am real and my experiences are real. For me wearable art captures the person, it surrounds them with what is usually hidden within.
When I create art it feels almost as though I’m turning myself inside out, using textiles, ceramics, and hand written text to explain my insides. These mediums physically ground abstracts such as emotions, feelings and memories, creating something tactile, visible and physically real.
Text is the signature that I keep coming back to no matter what I'm making. If I don't include my writing in my art it is as if I'm taking myself and my voice out of it. It will still be hundreds of hours, my Blood Sweat and Tears poured into it, but without my writing it doesn't feel like it fully belongs to me. It is like I've lost my ability to communicate.
It is a slow process of learning, understanding and processing who I am and why. When I have completed all the groundwork in an artwork and I know my concept inside out and every element has a place within that concept, words begin to fill my brain. I use cursive as it feels like me, again capturing my physicalities and making them inseparable from my art. I can see every movement I use, turning myself into a visual noise that is understandable but only with time and attention. When I am writing I let my steam of consciousness in relation to my artwork take over, and it becomes a direct unfiltered connection between my art and my brain.
My art becomes a new way for people to perceive me and a new place for a part of me to live. It It is a physical form which I connect with more than my actual body.