Joyce ter Weele (1988) graduated from Academie Minerva in Groningen in 2015, and was awarded the “Coba de Groot” stipend that same year. Ter Weele’s work revolves around the adventure that is observation, and the (re)defining of familiar spaces and forms that is inherent to it. To this end, ter Weele produces drawings in which diverse materials and techniques are combined, including but not limited to charcoal, pencil, fineliner, graphite; collage, photography, printmaking and painting. The common denominator, the carrier, is exclusively paper.

Her starting principle rests in the figurative reality captured in her photos, which then serve as the starting point of abstract drawings. In doing so, Joyce makes her environment into her research grounds and her landscape of creativity. Architectural constructions in which humans are absent, in both modern as well as historical buildings, are her main source of inspiration.

Curiosity is the key concept in Joyce Ter Weele’s art. Joyce is curious about the practice of combining materials and techniques. Besides this, she arouses both her own and the viewer’s curiosity about the meaning of her work.

Joyce is always looking for something new. She does so by using different techniques in her studio. She follows these actions throughout her creative process. Our imagination is stimulated by figurative and abstract forms of which it is not clear how they relate to each other, demonstrated by a wide variety of shades and refined blue-black keys.

Photography plays an important role as well. Joyce incorporated many photographs that she personally took on her travels abroad into her collages and drawings. These almost unrecognizable images are all photos of places that have been abandoned by their former residents. The places have lost their function. Nature takes up space. But does this mean that these places also lose their meaning?

Joyce does not explain how she wants us to interpret her work, therefore, we have to do it without any references, titles or notes. As spectators we are given free rein and this allows us to lose ourselves in the landscapes. This is exactly how Joyce relates herself to her work between her studio walls: shuffling, sliding, retrieving and wondering. The result is alienation: we cannot look at her work in a certain way and simply come to an obvious conclusion. She makes us doubt our own observations. Viewed from above, from the viewpoint of e.g. a buzzard, the black areas could be mountains or land, or even a river valley. But seen through a microscope, the form may represent minerals. Perhaps we see galaxies? Or something completely different?

Finally, Joyce’s work provides an environment in which we must divert from our regular patterns. We often too quickly put on understanding. Sometimes it’s perfectly fine not to understand everything. That unknown is more than necessary to expand our known framework. The philosopher Hegel warns us against what he calls “the calcified”, the only thing we really should be afraid of. If we only want to see what we already know and ignore the unknown, we don’t add anything to our thinking pattern and our personal experiences. In that case we will freeze, we will “calcify”.

Unfilled areas give calmness according to Joyce. Thus, she provides us with conditions for silence. Silence creates meaning; silence meaning more than just the absence of sounds; silence that arises when we do not engage in the aim of benefit and seek for the familiar.

In the end, there is no meaning in the world. We find meaning that we ourselves put into it. What meaning this is, we can only figure out if it is quiet for a moment, if we postpone our aim for knowing, but hear our own thoughts.
What Joyce makes, is never finished. Neither for herself nor for her spectators. Everytime we see something different, we give a different meaning to what we see. This is what makes her work highly relevant and continually fascinating.