The work was created some time in between 1995 and 1999.
I was living in a very small ‘half-room’ apartment on the 2ndfloor at the crowded Albert Cup Market in the center of Amsterdam, in a neighborhood called ‘De pijp’.
It was so small and crowded so my own back, the window and the neighbors were not more then 2-3 meters apart.
In the Netherlands most of the year it is cold and people live inside their own living room, so most contact with the outside world is in cafes, bars or only visually through the windows.
In such situations you may imagine knowing this or that person through the closed window, but if you approach a person on the street… Well this may be considered a non-Dutch thing to do.
So, me then, I felt forced to adopt the saying of Saint Ambrose: ‘When in Rome, do as the Romans do’ and had to conform to these social habits.
At some point, after a few years living at this ‘half apartment’ came the mobile, work I named ‘field of vision’.
