In April this year Sheila was one of several artists invited by the Brussels based organisation CIFAS to spend 10 days thinking about Public Space in relation to the Covid-19 crisis. Questions she was asked to consider were:
How do we make art at a time when everyone fears for their health and that of their loved ones? Is there an art of confinement? What artistic strategies should be deployed in order to create in this context? What has become of public space today?
CIFAS are an organisation that have been working with artists in public space for 10 years, investigating the city as an open space for reflection and action, organising workshops, debates and artistic interventions. Sheila last worked with the organisation in 2016 when she was commissioned to make something for ‘Art Facing Terror’ (following the Brussels bombings of that year).
Starting points for Sheila with this commission have been the idea of care, her reluctance to respond to the present moment with art, the public space in relation to the garden, and perhaps her dreams, because even if she is confined, she “still finds herself in the public space and interacting with others every night while she sleeps..."
Sheila will share the work she has made as a result of this commission later this month….
