Vreta Kloster: Place for Sharing by Erica van Seeters on Uddenskulptur 2026
As a contribution to Uddenskulptur 2026, Erica van Seeters has created a new sculpture from a monumental block of stone: a 10-tonne mass, approximately 150 cm high, made from a rare material somewhere between granite and diabase.
From this solid block, Vreta Kloster: Place for Sharing gradually emerged during 23 days of intensive work at KKV-B. At first glance, the convent may appear to stand upon the stone like a pedestal. But in fact, it grows out of it — as though the complex of buildings had always been hidden within the material, waiting to be revealed.
The choice of Vreta Kloster is deeply meaningful. During the early medieval period, monasteries and convents such as Vreta Kloster were places of great importance: centres of learning, care, cultivation and spiritual life. Benedictine nuns preserved and shared knowledge about plants, healing, writing and everyday practices. The convent became a place where human cooperation, discipline and knowledge could take form.
In Erica van Seeters’ work, the convent becomes a symbol of sharing from the heart — not through religious dogma, but from one individual to another, in freedom; rooted in the earth beneath our feet and connected through the heart, also with nature. The architecture rises directly from the stone, carried by the same ground that carries us. It is not placed above nature, but formed by it.
This idea strongly resonates throughout Erica van Seeters’ artistic practice. In her work, stone is never merely solid matter; it is also space, movement and energy — an ancient material that carries both weight and transformation. Here, history, landscape, philosophy and artistic creation come together in a single gesture: a convent growing out of stone.
Follow the progress of the work as the form slowly reveals itself.
