Gleaned from
Painting installation shown at Galleri Brandstrup
2024, Oslo, Norway
Rubber boots trampling dried plants. Snapping of branches and stalks. Stepping in and out of light beams. Bucket swinging. Left to right. Rough hands probing the muddy surface just after the fields filled with water, before the sand and water mixture became too murky. A dense wall of insect chirps. Kissing, or is it pecking the skin? Not one paddy crab was found that night.
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Rubber boots trampling dried rice stalks. Stepping up and down from raised surfaces. Snap, snap, snap. Light dots strewn across the fields. Black crickets spring up high, then bury themselves under the dried stalks. Homemade thunder machine: a large plastic bag, taped to a bamboo stick. Left, right, swoosh, swoosh. Tricking the crickets into thinking the weather has turned. And when they surface, thud! They’re plucked and put into a mesh bag.
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Rubber boots trampling moist flowerbeds. Rapid clack-clack-clack. Silence. Clack-clack-clack. Silence. Rows and rows of thin rubber trees. A mini dot of light in the distance, insect like. White liquid fills the scar-like grooves. Silent drip, drip, drip. Clack-clack-clack. Drip, drip, drip. Until the sky shifts from phthalo blue to violet red.
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