From Ladder to Box

From Ladder to Box

This work emerged through a process of thinking through making and learning from materiality. After finding an old discarded ladder, I became interested in how the object could be reconfigured without losing what it already was. Rather than introducing new materials, the entire ladder was repurposed, reusing its timber, screws, nails, hinges, and structural components. Through a process of disassembly and reassembly, the material was given a new configuration while retaining traces of its previous life.

The resulting artefact exists between ladder and box. It is neither entirely one nor the other. The ladder remains present through its worn timber, construction, and evidence of use, while the box introduces a new role as a container for drawings, documents, and collected ideas. Both identities coexist within the same object.

This understanding was influenced by the figure of Odradek, described as simultaneously alive and inert, familiar yet difficult to define. In a similar way, Ladder to Box resists a fixed classification. It carries memories of movement, ascent, labour, storage, and preservation at the same time. The object is not a replacement of one identity with another but a continuation of material becoming.

The work reflects on how materials persist through transformation, acquiring new meanings while retaining traces of previous ones. Rather than treating matter as passive, it recognises the capacity of objects to endure, adapt, and participate in ongoing cycles of use, decay, and renewal.