Corpus Integrum

The project highlights various aspects of the diverse human being, and sculptures that express a broad definition of the body.

The only thing we really know is our own body, but how we look at it and communicate with it is culture dependent. The body is the individual’s tool for communicating, to himself and others, about identity. Every culture is body-centered, but the symbolic interpretation is culture-specific. Any suffering or perception of right or wrong, are colored by their cultural contexts, and various people’s meetings in the public space, therefore, will depend on the cultural context one is in and the cultural ballast one carries with them. The meetings between people become interactions between body and mind – and interpretations of symbols, signs and signals.

Speech and language are the tools for seeking insight, not just in abstract and general terms, but in seeking insight into ourselves, in our subjective experiences, in our own bodies.

Only during our recent past to the present has our body ideals changed from one extremity to another; where, in some cultural settings, the chubby and fat body was seen as a status symbol, as a sign of prosperity, while in today’s Western context it is seen as a problem that can lead to a variety of diseases, and that the overweight body is interpreted  as with psychological and moral deficiency, such as lack of self-control.

While especially the western average weight is increasing, the well-trained body is emphasized more and more as an ideal, but it does not symbolize the worker’s body as a result of physical hard work, on the contrary; – success in the form of extra time, money and profits to keep the body fit. Our bodies become symbolic tools to show that you are in control. Extreme manifestations of this are various forms of anorexia – which, in principle, are often not about fat phobia, but using what you have closest and the only thing you feel you can control; your own body, to define yourself.

This project is an expression of the overall and at the same time diverse volume and power of a human being; Corpus Integrum – The Unified Body.