TICKETS

This work was created back when I was living in Arnhem, just after finishing my studies. Together with my classmate Roderick Pieters, I ended up in the building of the old railway station, which was awaiting renovation after the new NS station had opened. We had space to work there, but we had no idea what to do with ourselves next. It was that difficult moment – studies are over, one foot already stands in adult life, while the other is still stuck in the land of dreams.

In our free time we would go to the newly opened station. We sat on the benches on the platform, eating and watching people heading toward their destinations. Some were leaving, others returning. And we just watched. I began to pick up the discarded tickets lying on the ground – perhaps out of a small, inexplicable envy that they knew where they were going, and I did not yet.

I collected a huge number of them. I have an entire drawer full. From those tickets I made pendants – collections of other people’s directions, other people’s routes. Today they are a fond memory of that time. Those kinds of tickets no longer exist in the Netherlands, and that version of Agata, who didn’t yet know what came next, no longer exists either.