'Coulda' & 'Shoulda', 2015

The artistic output of Gijs Assmann (1966, the Netherlands) is prodigious, varied and infused with humor. ‘Coulda’ and ‘Shoulda’ are part of a tri-part series, the third piece being called ‘Woulda’. The titles are a playful reference to the rhyming compound ‘Shoulda-Coulda-Woulda’ in which each of the three elisions means something different, but when taken together convey a unified meaning: ‘spare me the useless excuses.’ ‘Coulda’ and ‘Shoulda’ - a ceramic ship and zeppelin set in glass domes that were used in the company’s former laboratory - speak to Assmann’s artisanal interest in ships in bottles and are in fact references to a message in a bottle. The boat and zeppelin symbolize a commonly felt longing to escape to a better place. However, the imprisoning domes thwart any such journey. Assmann’s addition of symbols of intoxication completes the suggestion of journeys imagined.