The essence of the meeting
“Basic human contact, such as eye contact and verbal exchange, is to the psyche what oxygen is to the brain. If you feel let down by the world, interact as much as you can.”
Martha Beck
Squares are places where people traditionally gather, meet and exchange business. Not only products and services, but also news and personal stories. Yet more often than not, the focus is mainly on the economy, parking space, etc. and little attention is paid to the social dimension.
This arrangement symbolically offers the space to start a conversation again. The chairs are sawn out of oak tree trunks. They provide a solid foundation to share, thoughts, experiences and stories during conversation.
The bark on the planks symbolizes transience. It shows the passage of time. Everything changes in a continuous flow. The COVID pandemic recently taught us that everything is transient. Nothing is static.
Nature also shows transience. The bark of a tree that is slowly decaying. Applied to our daily lives, impermanence is an invitation to “flow” every day and enjoy the moment, without being shattered by the weight of the past or scared off by the uncertainties of the future.
The circles of iron, discoloured by nature in brown tones, represent a form of completeness and connection. The round shape of a circle is associated with the connection to love, energy and power. The circle is also frequently used as a symbol of infinity.
With this attitude I want to give an impulse to the feeling of ‘being there’, meeting and sharing is essential for that.
Tjitze Hoekstra
Inhabitant of Saint Pompon
June 2022