SANNÉ MESTROM

By bringing these contested ideologies out of the gallery and into the realm of civic space, Mestrom alter’s the terms on which artistic value is set. For this reason, her sculptural works critically incorporate the participatory potential of “play” as a means to question the physical and social consequences of urban design. Simultaneously, her works shift the “hands-off” convention of viewing art toward a more inclusive “hands-on” engagement with the work, subverting the museological conventions of Art by softening the assumed division between art and everyday life (Kaprow 1993).

The benefits of her large-scale playable-sculptures are clear: these intergenerational, playable works activate public spaces intellectually, imaginatively as well as physically. They engage the people traversing these spaces on two core levels — on the one hand as contemporary, site-responsive conceptual artworks, and on the other hand as interactive, intergenerational sites of play.

Text courtesy the artist