This installation, titled Zon Weef—Dutch for “weaving the sun”—originated from a fleeting phenomenon observed during a residency in Enschede. The title reflects the act of weaving Dutch sunlight into space, capturing the essence of light as material.

 

On a quiet afternoon, a unique alignment of Dutch sunlight, spatial orientation, and the hairline-finished aluminum surface created an unexpected arc of reflection on a white wall—like a man-made rainbow. This coincidental moment prompted an exploration into how light, material, movement, and time might be woven into a living experience.

 

Enschede’s history as a center of textile production—particularly symbolized by the Jacquard loom—informed the conceptual foundation of the work. The hairline texture of the aluminum directs sunlight in a vertical orientation, acting like warp threads stretched across a loom. As wind passes through the suspended units, they gently sway, causing the reflected light to drift horizontally across the wall. This lateral motion evokes the insertion of weft threads, while simultaneously recalling the movement of sails catching wind.

 

In this trembling fabric of light, one may sense the memory of the Netherlands’ history of wind-powered industry—its ships, windmills, and the landscapes shaped by air in motion.

 

The atelier is thus conceived as a large-scale loom, in which sunlight enters from outside as a thread drawn through the structure of space, ultimately materializing in the hall as a completed fabric of light. This approach resonates with the Japanese concept of mitate, in which one thing is deliberately reinterpreted as another, allowing reality to be poetically reorganized. Here, light becomes textile, the hidden mechanism becomes a metaphorical loom, and the phenomenon itself is transposed into an act of weaving.

 

The core apparatus is intentionally placed out of sight, behind a closed door—a gesture rooted in Japanese aesthetics that value boundaries, suggestion, and the unseen. What the viewer encounters are traces: light, shadow, and an intangible presence. By concealing the source and revealing only its effects, the work invites imaginative participation, allowing the phenomenon to unfold in the “in-between” space where perception meets interpretation.

 

A suspended fabric further extends the work as a time-recording medium. Through cyanotype printing, reflected light gradually accumulates over the course of the exhibition. Initially white, the fabric slowly deepens into blue over several days, completing itself as a “cloth of light.”

 

The installation’s appearance continues to change with the shifting position of the sun until around 19:00, encouraging repeated visits to witness new configurations of the phenomenon.

 

In a city once woven from threads, light, time, weather, and memory now interlace into a new textile. This installation stands as a quiet loom of phenomena—where nature and industry, chance and structure, visibility and invisibility are gently woven into presence.