The non-linear narratives are shaped by revisiting memoirs of her past both through drawing and subjective thinking, ultimately reflecting itself through mono-prints.
The mono-prints imitate the subjective recollection of memoirs by use of line and color which relates the artist’s mind to the presence of her artistic subjects.
The artistic subjects are often found in an ambiguous space at the time being drawn, unaware of the viewer being present, in a state of subjective thinking, as is the artist at the time of revisiting the memoirs.
The mono-prints denote the process of remembering in that it provides a fresh dimension of color, line and emotion toward past images, often leaving the viewer ambiguously pondering about the recollected space in time, ultimately within a state of subjective thinking.
Place and displacement are recurring themes in van Rooyen’s work. She is inspired by the literature and history of her home country, South Africa, particularly sources of history-as-narrative – referring to the written, drawn and recorded impressions of events by those who are present as observers. She is attracted to the subjective nature of theses source.
Her new monotype prints continue with this interest in place and displacement. The interior or domestic landscape of these works is strangely confining. The furniture contains or limits the supine or seated figures. Here the home is made uncomfortable by its spatial construction.
