Dear Eszter and Simon!
I am very happy that your lives arrived to this day when you acknowledge your love and your belonging to each other and to the world. I have been excited ever since your engagement and I couldn’t wait to take part in your big day if only from the other end of the world.
For weeks now I have been working on something that could express my thoughts and feelings about this time of your life. I think I created something that will always remind me of how deeply I am touched today and I hope this object will be matching your house well enough for you to be able to enjoy it. Let me tell you a little more about the background of this work.
I am privileged to know Lesley Towart, an exceptionally talented and sensitive ceramic artist living in Granity, New Zealand. She always welcomed me in her creative life and I was lucky enough to be present (and pregnant with my first baby) when she started her long journey working with reliquaries. After watching her work evolve for years, then being separated from her for a long time I found that my mind is continuously occupied by this peculiar art form. I find it adventurous, intimidating, overwhelming and terrifying to think about group of small possessions and trinkets that gain importance by taking up the task of solely expressing our lifeline in a small box left behind after our death. For years I have been amazed by Lesley’s courage to manage the contradictions and paradoxes this concept raises: fragile objects remaining after the destruction of once robust bodies; a period of time summarized in a very restricted space; everyday objects representing a unique life. Grasping something infinite and still, not existent anymore is a fascinating job. For a long time I thought it would be an impossible task for me but I found my mind frequently occupied with the idea.
Now however, when Eszter asked for an artwork for your home, I realised that a reliquary is the only valid object that can express the impact of your Wedding Day. Births, deaths and marriages, summarizes the name of the Ministry responsible for the three pillars of our lives on this world. All related to the reliquary I started making for you.
This work I am sending you contains two levels.
The frame of this reliquary represents the supernatural, Heaven, the afterlife, the eternal and infinite, the spiritual world, where none of our world is recognisable. This world frames, surrounds and defines this limited life on Earth and from there the water of life is flowing into our world.
The inside of the reliquary represents our life here. Inside it the person present, the observer has two faces but only one eye. The faces stand for your bodies and the eye stand for your feelings. From now on, you Eszter and Simon are going to share a life. You are going to share your house, your friends, your food, your travels, your families and you are going to dissolve into one person as you share your interests, goals and names. In two bodies you’ll share your feelings as you look at your life.
The water of life will appear in forms of tears in your eyes in great moments of happiness and grief as it will on you Wedding Day. These tears will run clear in the warmth of your home, your family, your love. But place your lives (and your reliquary) into a cold place of disinterest, contempt and denial, and your tears will be the tears of blood and suffering. Let the change of color remind you that the warm rays of the loving sun that shine through the water of life are compassion, care and acceptance.