LARIMAR|TENDER EMOTIONS, object, group show Digital Detox Gallery M, Opole, Poland, 2021
Larimar, also known as the "dolphin's stone", is a rare form of pectolite that is found only in the Dominican Republic (Caribbean). Its unique color resembles the color of the local waters surrounding tropical beaches. In esoterics, larimar represents tender emotions. In the era of a pandemic, especially during the lockdown period, I experienced tenderness and sensitivity mainly through the internet. Emotional waves were flowing through my social media, visualized by emoticons and emojis. The symbol of these emotions was the white seal that came to me with the larimar stone when I decided to cut myself off from the virtual world and go on a journey into myself during the Neo-Shaman ritual. At one point, I noticed that the visions in my imagination are kept in the aesthetics of WhatsApp, and the pictograms representing feelings on social media definitely shape my fantasy. I also realized that I have a lot of experience in this digital world, and that there will be no material trace of these experiences. So I decided to capture the "tender emotions" flowing through my links, to give them a real dimension. So, based on the correspondence in social media, I created a series of traditional letters. White pages hidden in white envelopes feature "images of feelings" from several dozen days of exchange of digital sensitivities.The creation of this work was a digital detoxification not only on an ideological level, but also on a processual level. So I chose sensitive craftsmanship and a return to analog creation of items. The long hours spent creating envelopes and letters from scratch allowed the wave of feelings to return through manual work. Recreating Internet correspondence is the process of transforming the binary code into a reality in which touch and sensitivity are still important. I wanted to create something real before we all disappear into the metaverse.