The Gate

THE GATE, Dom Twórczy Kadenówka, Rabka-Zdrój Poland (metal work)

On the border separating the interior of the house from its outside there are places of passage. They allow movement between these two areas. The interior of the house / household is a sacred sphere, and everything that is outside of it, the external world, is in this case profane. “Open doors can connect, but closed, isolate two different worlds: realms of the living and the dead, earthlings and gods. This means that the door or gate is associated not only with the physical crossing of the border, but also with all transitions and transformations, e.g. the status of individual people, and with expeditions into the afterlife. ” This zone is a place of mediation, change, and a liminal area, therefore it must be protected against what is foreign, evil, demonic, that is, everything that can invade from the outside. When thinking about the design of the gate and wicket for a historic house like Kadenówka, I took these aspects into account. By setting the project in the local context, I wanted to include in the gate itself magical elements and symbols that function as apotropeions, which has protective magic properties. I used the symbol of a six-pointed rosette (which already appears in the Slavs and we also know it from Podhale region). The characteristic “eyes” are a reference to the several-meter-long sculpture I made in 2016 in cooperation with Iddi Bashir. We negotiated all the differences and opposites we embody, woman – man, Christian – Muslim, white skin – black, global north – global south. Standing at opposite poles, we have created our own universe, a field of cooperation, coexistence and co-creation. I called the sculpture the Eye of God. These triple Eyes of God are now protecting Kadenówka.