Biography
Csilla Klenyanszki (b. 1986) was born and raised in Hungary. She lives and works in the Netherlands. After her Dutch Language and Literature & Communication Science Studies at the Karoli Gaspar University in Budapest, she completed her BA Photography at the Willem de Kooning Academy in Rotterdam and she is currently enrolled at the Dutch Art Institute. Csilla founded the Mothers in Arts Residency in 2016 (www.mothersinarts.com), a studio space combined with communal daycare. The Residency specialises in supporting emerging women artists, who are also mothers. The Residency gives new mothers an opportunity to continue their artistic development.
Csilla's work has been exhibited nationally and internationally in the Netherlands, Hungary, Poland, Germany, Ireland and South Korea. In 2018 she won the Still life prize at the 33rd Festival International de Mode & de Photographie in Hyères, France. Her first book, "Pillars of home" was shortlisted for the Unseen Dummy Award 2018 and for the First PhotoBook Award by the Paris Photo-Aperture Foundation PhotoBook Awards in 2019.
Portfolio
House/Hold
House/hold is part of a research project on women’s position in western society. It examines the evolution of gender equality in various subjects. House/hold investigates the housework gap and its consequences while it provides an ironical solution for women: a 30-minute yoga session combined with domestic chores.
The session transforms the house into a space for meditation using domestic objects as its basic elements. Housework is being transformed into illumination: the repetitive act of house making becomes not just a physical but also a mental and spiritual act where women and their household objects become entangled. House/hold is a guide for domestic meditation.
Portfolio
Pillars of Home
The challenges of early motherhood are transformed into a game: the lack of time, the fragility of a new life, the weight of responsibility, our changing identities, tension. These are the elements. Care, strength, patience, devotion. These are the things holding it together.
Pillars of home are ninety-eight balancing sculptures, made during her son’s nap, when the artist’s home - the living room, the kitchen, the bedroom or even the staircase - became a studio for no more than thirty minutes at a time.
The pillars rely on their own inner stability while being framed only by the floor and the ceiling. As the objects are being piled up, they become a coherent entity, but their delicate arrangement and balancing structure make them vulnerable. They can be destroyed at any moment.
Not only the existence of the image is in danger if the installation collapses, but the noise of the fallen objects might awaken the sleeping baby, which puts an end to the working session.
Pillars of home gives ninety-eight answers to one dilemma: how does a mother find a balance between all her priorities. A never-ending juggling act.
Portfolio
To make time
To make time deals with the passage of time, not just as a symbol or an idea, but as subjective experience; Csilla needs to find time to make time. Making times takes time.
The work is based on 12 physically and mentally challenging - one hour- performances which capture my struggle with time, while mechanically making it. The physical body - the right leg used as the minute arm, and the left leg as the hour arm of a clock - show the passage of time, transforming every single minute into a new posture. 720 different positions are building up the 12-hour clock. To make the work Csilla raced against her own biological clock, as the performer needs to be relatively young to full fill the choreography.
To make time was made during - a self-funded - residency, called Mothers in Arts and it was supported by the Mondriaan Fonds.
The work is a part of a series of exercises that test Csilla capability for creating order and finding harmony. These exercises, called "Flexible Hours" deal with different forms of time-based balance, while exploring her mental and physical equilibrium.
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