The work "PSYCHE" belongs to the genre of art installation, and has as its central motif the image of the butterfly,a traditional symbol of metamorphosis which has fascinated artists since antiquity. The artwork is composed of a myriad of butterflies, each exhibiting
numerous chromatic variations, and captured in their downward spiral towards eternity. The work is inspired by the idea of ‘liberation’, the human being, his inner energy, his
essential ‘I’ maneouvred in the fragile symbol of the butterfly. Thereby creating a
psychological resonance suturing the viewer into the timeless play of stasis and transition.
The title of the work is the Greek word "psyche" meaning "soul","breath", and also "butterfly". These seemingly unrelated terms become congruent in the process of
decoding the artistic creation. The genesis of this installation has its starting point in the
recollection of a succession of tragic episodes in human history, in particular the unimaginable suffering of prisoners in concentration camps, some as young as five, who drew butterflies with their fingernails or anything that came hand, on the walls that
imprisoned them. This act seems to represent the embodiment of imminent death and
the unconscious desire for their souls to turn into butterflies, thereby offering them an all
too brief moment of freedom. Interestingly, for many years after the Holocaust, thousands
of butterflies were frequently seen at Auschwitz and other death camps, descending to earth. Thus the art installation becomes a tribute to prisoners in the labour camps and ghettos,
capturing the anguish of survival in a hostile environment. In this context, the butterfly
becomes a symbol of fragility and temporality, suggesting.the desire to fly, to find release
from the claws of suffering.
However, my work does not address past events exclusively, but also draws parallels to the contemporary. Today, we build our own personal "camps", dependent upon individual toxic relationships. We have succeeded in constructing a society that
is slowly becoming more contaminated more uninhabitable - both literally and figuratively.
The butterfly marked by its ineffability and transiency remains an allegory of all the beauty
and perfection of nature, which modern man appears hell bent on rendering to perdition.
However, along the barbed wire words of the contemporary flits the butterfly offering hope
and the possibilty of the eternal return.
