La camicia di forza

What is life

after so much death?

the guilt of innocence?

the counter-guilt

that weighs

as heavy

as the guilt of the slayer

as the blood-guilt

of the forgiven

the blame-shifters

The Survivor
Erich Fried, 1986

In this work, David Reijer de Haan wants to answer a simple question: how does one visualize trauma, specifically the one that has been freed from it’s direct influence? Inspired by both psychology and psychiatry, De Haan made a sound installation that is inspired by fixation.

It consists of multiple elements, fixated into place by both material and its moment of creation. Some are fixated by black chains, put on display. Others seem forgotten. Some parts lost their use and their flexibility, and radiate a certain hopelessness.

The elements communicate to eachother through form and tones, and it’s silence is only being broken by a soundscape that communicates one simple image: a faded photo of a forgotten event. It’s what De Haan thinks trauma looks like: the numbness of a repressed memory which you try to reflect and move on from, while at the same time not knowing how to.