Willemijn de Groot
_ CV
_ Contact

My work is about the human body, the body showing itself or hiding – or trying to hide. My interest in the expression of the body led me to investigate how its shape is affected and sometimes even transformed by emotions. Emotions are chemicals in the head, yet we often experience them as being located somewhere in the body.

A source of inspiration is modern dance, which allows me to analyze how postures, movements and gestures communicate and how emotions are related to the body.

I show this expression in thread on textile. For me, thread corresponds to the transparency and fragility of the body and of feelings. At the same time, the persistence of the thread echoes the impossibility of getting rid of unwanted emotions, like hair in a shower drain.

The main technique I use in these works is called “cyanotype” (blueprint) which I adapted to my own ideas and needs. I discovered that the tactile thread figures I made could be printed using this technique without losing their tactile quality. At the same time an entirely new kind of image emerges, because the thread is transformed into a graphic line. 



Human emotions are never static. They fluctuate. They do not last for days, only for a few moments. Something of the fleeting character of emotions is reflected in my works, which are not static but dynamic. As visitors walk around the silk prints, they cause the images to move. This element of movement is taken a step further in the projections, where thread figures are transformed into floating images of light.