Title: Sum

Media: Etched zinc plate, paper

Dimensions: 3 panels of 25 cm x 15.5 cm

Sum is an intimate monument to the life of the artist’s grandfather who died in 1998. The central panel features an accurate sum of all the days he lived, etched in zinc. Note the beautiful number: 28882. Blank pieces of paper frame the piece on either side. Although referencing the print medium, no actual print has been taken from the plate.

The humble simplicity of the sum, and the blank pieces of paper, speak of the difficulty of paying homage to a life – what to include, what to leave out. By simply adding up all the days in a life, from birth to death, leaving nothing out, the artist has tried to capture and hold it all, however futile and inadequate this gesture may seem.

The piece has been composed as a triptych, thus referencing Christian religious art. Read in this context, the three panels take on a slightly different reading: the blank papers can be read as a reference to the ‘unknown’ before and after a life lived in a concrete and measurable reality.