Chelsea Wartenbergh

Interior architecture - bachelor - Zwolle - 2026

You are standing on a train platform. It is crowded, people move past you, shoulders bumping into one another. Someone tries to get through the crowd but cannot get through. Trains arrive and depart, yet you remain where you are. You wait. The moment stretches out; time no longer seems to move in sync with the world around you. You have no control over what is happening. At first, this feels uncomfortable, as though you are trapped in a situation beyond your grasp. But when you stop resisting and allow the moment to unfold, something shifts. Light touches your face, the rhythm of the surroundings continues, and what once felt heavy becomes lighter. My work originates from a personal and societal fascination with helplessness: a complex feeling that cannot always be easily defined or understood. Within contemporary society, helplessness is often perceived as something to be avoided or resolved. There is a strong emphasis on control, self-determination, and positivity.

Yet helplessness is not an exception; it is a recurring part of everyday life. It manifests itself through our dependence on systems, on other people, and on circumstances that lie beyond our direct influence. Rather than approaching this feeling solely as a deficiency, I explore what happens when helplessness is acknowledged and allowed to exist.

The intention of my work is not to remove this feeling, but to make it visible and tangible. When helplessness is accepted, the way one relates to a situation begins to change. This is not about resignation; rather, by confronting thefeeling, awareness emerges. We may not always determine our circumstances, but we can influence how we relate to them. Within that awareness, resilience can develop.

This approach requires a translation that extends beyond language alone. In my work, helplessness is not explained but experienced spatially. The installation invites a physical encounter in which perception and movement are central.

The design consists of a series of surfaces that vary in transparency and texture. Some are clear, allowing light and sight to pass through unobstructed, while others are more diffuse and rough, blurring vision and creating uncertainty. These differences generate subtle disruptions in the way space is perceived and understood. The circulation route also plays a defining role. The path is fixed, requiring visitors to slow down and adapt. Whereas public spaces are typically designed to facilitate movement and flow, this installation introduces friction instead: movement is interrupted, sightlines are broken, and familiar expectations disappear. At the same time, light functions as an essential element within the design. It opens up the space, softens the experience, and provides moments of clarity within the constraints imposed by the surfaces and circulation. As a result, a tension emerges between softness and obstruction, with neither becoming fully dominant. This interplay forms the core of the work. By allowing these opposing qualities to coexist, helplessness is not resolved but made perceptible as part of the space and of the way we move through it. Helplessness is not presented as something to be overcome, but as a condition that unfolds in relation to space, movement, and perception.

Cwartenbergh@hotmail.com
Telefoon: +31 650414671