Sundowning—the term for increased confusion in the late afternoon and evening for people with Alzheimer’s.
Sundowning reflects on the tensions between permanence and impermanence and intends to resist modernist ideals of monolithic permanence. As its title suggests, Sundowning is a body of work in honour of my grandmother—Leslie—who has experienced the rapid cognitive decline as a result of Alzheimer’s Disease for the last eight years.
Concrete—a material associated with stability—becomes paradoxical. The aggregated and exposed edges stand as a material representation for the neurological fragmentation which defines Alzheimer’s Disease. Suspended from it, a pendant spotlighting one of the few pearls worn by my grandmother, fifty-eight years ago. In honour of the man I proudly call my grandfather—Paul—a brass ring glowing amid rupture. Rings below, all incomplete in form to signify absence and devotion.
Sundowning comes together as an exploration of how material decay becomes a phenomenological condition, questioning what remains once memory has eroded, while reinforcing that despite memory dissipating, it can still be embodied through material.
Mae West is an emerging silversmith and recent graduate from RMIT’s School of Art with a bachelor’s degree of Fine Arts. Based in Melbourne/Naarm, West works predominately in precious metals producing both fine jewellery and sculptural forms which interrogate the interrelationship between material and place.
Intertwining lived experience, theoretical inquiry and material experimentation, West positions her practice as a form of preservation, and as an active discourse between personal history, collective memory and place.
https://www.instagram.com/waemest/