Maja Bolier 

Displacement and Adaptation – Video

Netherlands 

“14.784 km – that is the distance between the two countries I grew up in. The distance between my parents, the distance between my two lives. I feel you find a lot of this distance in my work. In Everything I make, my films, drawings and collages, there is a certain fragmentation. A feeling of being there and not there at the same time. 

Most of my work begins with poetry, I write texts and narratives and out of this usually comes some kind of visual. Most of my films are made with a certain urgency, a need to express something. Although my films arise from an autobiographical context they are usually under- stood by a greater audience because they touch on themes of current importance. 

My film “Displacement and Adaptation” is about the feeling of coming from nowhere and everywhere at the same. About living a life of constant and sometimes forced migration. This is not only my story, for at this present time there are thou- sands of displaced people around Europe and the world. In “Displacement and Adaptation”, you see the monotonous footage, of roads, train stations, airports, trees, and powerlines. Places and things that are everywhere and could be anywhere. The black and white images are in constant fluctuation so that you cant get a grip on where you are. The film is accompanied by eerie sounds and female voice, a voice from nowhere, without a history, reciting a monolog always starting with the sentence: ‘Sometimes I awake not knowing where I am.’” 

Maja Bolier is an australian/dutch artist currently based in the Netherland.

For more information about the artist, check out: www.majairenebolier.wixsite.com/majairene.