‘Hond zonder achtergrond’

Where does the urge and desire to create come from? Does creating itself need meaning? To explore this, I immersed myself in the act of making something seemingly useless. I chose a stuffed dog whose background is unknown to me but clearly shows signs of a life already lived. I altered it through a single action: completely taking the stuffed animal apart and then reassembling it in exactly the same way. An audio recording I made while narrating each piece I detached, served as a blueprint to put the dog back together. The dog’s appearance has completely changed. What has emerged now is a dog I feel pity for and an audio recording of this torturous process. Has the dog now gained more meaning? Or does it simply remain a ‘Hond zonder achtergrond’(dog without a background)?

The portrait is my response to these unanswered questions. It is a reflection on the compulsion to make work, while simultaneously wanting to remain objective. When making the dog, I kept my distance, but with the portrait, I gave in to the need to assign meaning.