Peter Vickland Writes on “Twin Flame” by Ember de Boer

Article by Peter Vickland | June 2023

 “I enjoy my job because I get to feel like an evil villain,” said De Boer of her latest work, stabbing metal pipe in a suspiciously organ-esque fiberglass form, following her statement with maniacal laughter, “Mwa ha ha!”

The piece she punctures so sacrificially before me is called Twin Flame – a recent addition to De Boer’s body of sculptural work. Through a carnal spiderwebbed veil of fiberglass, and barbed wire, she’s inserting resin into the base of the dual forms via a home-crafted funnel and lead pipe.

There’s a spartan brutality in the way De Boer works. The relationship she builds with these materials as she shapes them into fine figures is fraught with questions, concerns, and even arguments, just as it is filled with laughter, light, and pleasure. It’s a real, living relationship, yielding a truly inspired result. 

ARTIST STATEMENT BY DE BOER

Two lovers, like matchsticks struck on impact- in a moment of dance—the balance of power, heat, and oxygen; an exchange of lifeforce.

Two hearts beating, the visceral feeling of being in love. To feel alive in the trust of another, to enter the dance of passion. To fall for another and to burn for them-  your energy, your resources, and your light burn for another.

I burn for you. I burn with you. We are the twin flame.

I burn in spite of my pain- despite the pain I feel every time you step on a landmine; a certain phrase, the way your voice tenses up. The landmines neither of us laid, how could you or I know how to never misstep?

 I love you not despite but rather through the trauma. A body full of barbs; landmines of past experiences ready to inflict near-invisible wounds all over again. The echoing pain of loving and finding your twin flame- before you have healed your trauma- the shadows, frustration, and visceral aliveness one must undergo to find a way to love again.