To Make words become things and not events
35x42 cm, C-print, Series of 5, 2014
The work consists of images of my mother’s handwritten transcriptions of popular songs. She is a singer who, being non-English speaking, cannot understand the meaning of the original words and through this process of transcribing, the song’s lyrics become a new or imagined language.
A selection was made of the lyrics that refer to geographical locations The different places are only evoked through a bastardised English and as such only a stereotype remains; an unreachable reference point. The intimate translation that unintentionally results, creates a new landscape, the words becoming things or signs of a place that exists only in personal dreams.
View of the installation: To make words become things and not events, Bicycle, Giovanni Giaretta/Renato Leotta Effetto Majorana (La Solfatara, recording of disappearance, Function Creep, Amsterdam, NL
Photo: Gert Jan van Rooij
A selection was made of the lyrics that refer to geographical locations The different places are only evoked through a bastardised English and as such only a stereotype remains; an unreachable reference point. The intimate translation that unintentionally results, creates a new landscape, the words becoming things or signs of a place that exists only in personal dreams.
![](https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/777503435bf664435d5bdec79ba0adb2fc0e7980862a6a388958601c9cbc77b6/014.A.Ateliers--FUNCTION-CREEP-2015-PH.GJ.jpg)
Photo: Gert Jan van Rooij
![](https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/31aeb606a79aecfab25480133baaa95a8e25f190f48e1dc8e17d991d63f77ea5/Portfolio-Giaretta-13.jpg)
![](https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/c83d2fc18a57dc1db41079be2f247c3f263b28741a585202416ca53bd8281556/Portfolio-Giaretta-12.jpg)
![](https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/ae10982e9dc8c73e1f551f4ba88935163d10d7a5b18d89664bdf07016f6bba27/NL-ACE-KLKL021645.jpg)
![](https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/7c675c0bafd6d24a8590ccf33ef91273b58d0547c50c3a13324a3621110fac44/NL-ACE-KLKL021647_.jpg)