2026-Origins – similar but different

A head covered with a bag hides the features and identity of the person wearing it.
Identity is shaped, constructed, covered with layers of visible, coded appearances? ) visible, coded? but what happens when the surface is broken? My project explores this tension between appearance and essence through work with ceramics, where the material itself becomes a metaphor.
I use red clay, a symbol of the universal raw material, covered with a white or black slip (like the different types of race). This outer layer, similar to a skin, conceals the true nature of the material. But by breaking it in places, the red clay reappears, like flesh laid bare, revealing the (depth of the material) and the common origin of the human being.
By confronting the opposition between a layer that conceals and a material that reveals itself, between the colour of the skin and what lies beneath, this project questions the social construction of racial differences. Black or white, these superficial layers are not the essence of the human being. If they are broken, what remains is the same fundamental material.
In the end, we are all made of the same earth, the same clay, the same origin. Identity is never fixed: it is a material in tension, a buried memory, a truth that reveals itself when we agree to break with appearances and look beyond imposed divisions.

I’m planning an installation of a group of even-numbered heads so as not to suggest a dominant theme, i.e. 6 white and 6 black, arranged in a large circle like a round table where everyone can see each other. They will be mounted on a metal rod so that they can be adjusted to the viewer’s eyes.