By Aneeka Afsar
I carve my way through books, burrowing caves inside them using nothing but my hands and trusted Stanley knife. The idea behind the sculptures stems from the notion that excessive knowledge can erode the human psyche.
My inspiration comes from my trip to Italy and viewing renaissance art. The decay of ruins, monuments, historical buildings and abandoned churches, lost and weathered away in the heart of Sicily, are a projection of the ongoing war between man and nature.
Twenty-five books make up the three-and-a-half-foot structure. I carve into each book using my knife, gaining hundreds of splinters in the process. The books I use are all nature-related encyclopaedias, history books and psychology books, to reflect the struggle between man and nature. I press against the boundaries of mixed media, choosing to explore seven or eight mediums and using materials including felt (organic wool); handmade crystals using Epsom salt; iron metal oxide paints; acrylic paint; oil paint; mod roc and clay.
The books represent man’s abuse of nature, and the decay of the books is nature’s way of reclaiming itself. The cave inside the books shows nature eroding man’s desire for knowledge and the pillars show nature eroding man made buildings.
It is like a Chinese Box: collating man vs nature throughout the sculpture and weaving both meanings into one another.
The Bard 