Hester Oerlemans |2

Obviously, the ears and empty speech bubbles Hester Oerlemans drew from extruded tubes refer to her severe hearing loss. But that’s just a starting point; who knows what words might appear in those bubbles, what the ears might turn into? The tubes look a lot like the modelling balloons the artist frequently uses – these just don’t deflate. One, mounted on the wall with handrail brackets, looks like the skateboards René Daniëls painted. The playful works are offset by drawings of migrants or refugees. The tension between them transpires in the casts Oerlemans made of balloons filled with balloons. Created with a procedure involving a vacuum chamber, the works are teeming with barely contained struggle and strife, with promises, threats perhaps. Some of the cast balloons were stuffed with cans, adding different connotations. Placed lopsided on a single beer can, the porcelain shapes are messing with gravity… or with your head.