yannick tossing.
My artistic practice is driven by the desire to represent the profound challenges faced by individuals living with Huntington’s disease. Through my work, I aim to convey both the physical and mental struggles caused by the illness, offering a visual and emotional exploration of how it disrupts daily life. By transforming everyday objects and manipulating familiar imagery, I strive to create pieces that resonate deeply, evoking the altered perceptions and obstacles experienced by those affected.
In my earlier works, I focused on sculpture as a medium to illustrate the physical difficulties caused by the disease. By deforming and reimagining common objects, I sought to symbolize how ordinary, functional items become sources of frustration and challenge. For instance, oversized or warped sculptures of chairs and shopping carts represent the loss of ease and independence. Features such as distorted orange wheels or exaggerated scales emphasize the transformation of mundane tasks—like sitting or shopping—into insurmountable obstacles for those struggling with Huntington’s. These physical alterations also metaphorically reflect the progressive degeneration of motor functions caused by the illness, creating a visceral connection between the artwork and the audience.
Over time, my focus shifted to exploring the mental and cognitive aspects of Huntington’s disease, leading me to experiment with photographic collages. This medium allows me to delve into themes such as memory loss, distorted perception, and the fragmentation of reality. Through layered compositions, I combine different places and moments from my life, evoking the fragmented and dreamlike nature of memory. Abstract elements and undefinable spaces symbolize the gaps and distortions in cognition caused by the disease, while the merging of disparate memories creates new narratives that explore the emotional weight of living with such a condition.
Together, my sculptures and photographic collages form a holistic exploration of Huntington’s disease, addressing its physical and mental impacts in a way that bridges personal experience with universal themes of struggle, resilience, and adaptation.
