Major Practical Project - Penny Klepuszewska

Penny Klepuszewska's project entitled 'Living Arrangements' focusses on how, where there is no family support close by, elderly people can often live an extremely isolated life, in some cases never even leaving their house. Here follows an extract from her artist's statement.

"'Living Arrangements' investigates an important subject for a society still coming to terms with its ageing population, sparked by the disturbing statistic that one in ten of our elderly people spend their lives utterly alone rarely encountering another human in their solitary day-to-day lives. The work focuses on the significant changes in family life over the last two decades and how this has created a large and expanding number of elderly people who are living alone, often with deteriorating health and no family support to hand. The home is often regarded as a place of shelter but for some in later life it can become an island of isolation, "a place of uncertainty, positioned between the conflicts of past memories and present emotions." Belovai/Spence 2011"

"Living Arrangements (No.23) 2006" © Penny Klepuszewksa

"Living Arrangements (No. 22) 2006" © Penny Klepuszewska

"Living Arrangements (No. 1) 2006" © Penny Klepuszewska

To me, I can just never imagine the home to be anything other than a place of shelter, a place you can always count on. I've never considered that for some it can become a prison; essentially cutting you off from the world and somewhere you grow to resent. Is this purely down to age? Or are there other factors to consider. Although these images don't contain people, they are almost portraits - set up to suggest that the scene has just been left, only moments ago. The minute details stand out - crumbs on the tablecloth, a dribble down the side of the pan, the single baked bean left on the underside of the metal spoon. Given the highly constructed nature of the images, this tells me these details have been deliberately included - perhaps suggesting that when you spend all day every day in the same routine, the smallest changes can take on new significance. So I know what I feel about my home, but what about if I was confined there? Perhaps it is nostalgia that is providing me with rose-tinted memories of the place.

http://www.contemporaryartsociety.org/become-a-member/artist-member/penny-klepuszewska/496