Deora Srianta

Deora Srianta — Irish for “restrained tears” — is a series of salt sculptures exploring time, memory and our countering need for both human connection and personal space. Built during the time of the coronavirus pandemic, they were inspired by Isak Dinesen’s words, “The cure for anything is salt water – sweat, tears, sea”. The work gives physical form to emotions held within.

Heads within hourglasses evoke lives passing, while salt embodies both preservation and erosion. Contained within vessels or nestled in unexpected places across a city closed to art, the sculptures become intimate monuments to uncounted lives and fleeting encounters.  Beautiful yet unsettling, they suggest that time does not simply pass: it accumulates, leaving traces within us and the world we share.