Self-Portrait 7

Cultural Programming
How we view the world is determined in part by the people around us and the geographic place where we grow up. My location is Christian-oriented, and that shapes my view, whether I like it or not. Not that that is a problem, just awareness of it is important.

Attached to a Cross
This bronze skin, a cast of my own, hangs on the wall. It hangs with its arms spread out, its head drooping and its feet lying across each other. An association is easily made. After all, crucifix means ‘fixed to a cross’.

Different ways of exhibiting
Self-Portrait 7 is always exhibited in different ways, both indoors and outdoors. Outside, I exhibit this work in a living tree. The occasion to exhibit Self-Portrait 7 in this way was provided by the purchase of a sculpture by the medieval Dutch sculptor Claus Sluter (c. 1389-1406) by the Rijksmuseum in 2021. This work carved from boxwood depicts Christ on the cross, with his mother Mary and the evangelist John. What makes the sculpture so exceptional is that the cross is formed by a “living tree” and not a man-made cross of dead wood. Thus it has become part of the cycle of life and death and refers directly to the tree in the garden of Eden.