Micheline Klagsbrun
Micheline Klagsbrun’s work is rich in themes of ocean voyages, underwater-scapes and shipwrecks. Her current body of work, Night Boats, was inspired by the recent discovery of a ship’s log detailing her father’s 1941 arrival in the U.K. In these new sculptures and drawings, the theme of the risky voyage is intertwined with family roots and the experience of dislocation. The current plight of refugees everywhere gives this work added resonance today. Michelineklagsbrun.com
My Polish-born parents were refugees living in Belgium when World War II uprooted their large families once again, this time scattering them to many countries including Cuba, Switzerland, Israel and the UK. My father ended up in Lisbon but was determined to reach London where he hoped to find my mother. Eventually he obtained passage on the SS Aguilla, a regular on the Lisbon-Liverpool-Lisbon route. Diverted to Glasgow by bombing, he landed safely in April 1941. On its next voyage, the SS Aguilla was sunk by a German U-Boat and all perished
Cyanotype and mixed media on paper 20x30” Fathoms Deep
In Fathoms Deep I use cyanotype, a 19th-century process, to reproduce the page from the ship’s log that records my father’s arrival, as well as my drawings of roots/branches, a submarine and a shipwreck. The dark blue evokes both the ocean depths and night skies: the white shadows are ghostly and haunting. The roots can be seen as seaweed entanglements as well as the connections of family trees. The glow in the ship suggests persistence of life and resilience as seen in the luminescent deepsea creatures that have adapted to extreme conditions.
2020 38x11x18” Mixed media sculpture Prayers On The Night Boat
This mixed-media sculpture expresses the dislocation and risky migrations of my family as they escaped from and to various countries. Its precarious quality speaks to my father’s sea voyage to the UK. Patched together from a variety of unseaworthy materials, it evokes the refugees’ desperation and determination to escape, their resourcefulness and resilience. The “sails” are made to resemble water, constructed from a translucent combination of drawing fragments, tree bark, medium and pigment. On the bark of the sails I have inscribed in Hebrew the prayer for safe travel. On the bark that forms the main body of the boat insects have inscribed their own prayers in their own calligraphy.