3s 2012 | Tina Skukan Gallery Pretoria

Ariana Van Heerden’s work embodies shape-shifting manifestations of continually active forces of nature as metaphors of transience and change in life. What fascinates her furthermore is that these dynamic phenomena are invariably part of a greater, often concealed, continuum. Natural phenomena are fitting metaphors of this potentially mysterious process which may manifest as wind shaping a body of water into waves; sand formations or islets being built or eroded by oceanic tides; the seemingly random cladding of the earth’s tectonic crust through precipitation in the form of snow; or microcosmic systems such as termite mounds being moulded by conditions during their formation.