Sunanda Koning, Kū, ArtEZ
‘Kū’ is about transitions – a celebration of life and death and the stories we leave behind after we pass away. After death, in the memories of others, we’re better, bigger, faster, stronger than we were in reality. Our beauty may well be in our decay; our impermance and fragility.
In the book ‘Heavenly Bodies,’ skeletons mostly from the Roman catacombs lavishly decorated and put up as saints in various churches are portrayed. Given a new life after death, to serve as an example of what awaits for those who live a ‘good’ life. A kind of eternity in transcience.
I tried to capture this duality with in silhouettes – large shrouds or lush caftans, in fabrics, colors and materials – a high-quality (but slightly boring) lamawool blends into a plastic mix fabric, ton-sur-ton red lurex merges into a red wool by way of sequins, plastic bottles become deathly flowers, embroidered with Czech glassbeads and derinking straws. Dead stock items such as jeans and reworked sunglasses are added as styling components.
By carefully reworking fabrics and trash materials, new life, value and meaning is given to the perishable. Through a labour of love, a moment to be still yet a moment to run wild.
Sunanda Koning (Vlissingen, 1983) graduated from ArtEZ with a BA in Fashion Design in 2010. During her studies she interned at Anna Sui in New York, and after graduating at Vlisco in The Netherlands. Subsequently she worked as a freelance designer and photographer, showing her work in a solo exhibition in Kathmandu, Nepal in 2011.
She started her MA Fashion Design degree at ArtEZ in 2012.
https://www.mistermotley.nl/sites/default/files/storage/media/K%C5%AB%20…
Kū illustration book
Photography (c) Louise te Poele