The work of Margi Geerlinks (1970, Kampen) is concerned with the ways humans create an identity for themselves, and the forces that seem to govern this process. She takes four of the Ten Commandments and digitally imprints them on children. She portrays the ageing process by commenting on the ways modern society tries to slow that same process down. The directness of these images may come across as quite blunt, but every visible detail is there to warn us not to jump to conclusions. The children may bear these condemning moral codes on their chests; their pose and actions display a very human insecurity.

Being deeply physical, Geerlinks’ art confronts us with the many things that literally mould our beings into shape. Displaying the effects of science, religion, morality and time, Geerlinks’ photographs are a timeless testament of the human condition. Using the body as a canvas, she tries to show both the current identity of the person photographed and the things that make her become someone else. She seems to categorize the different stages of a human life by representing them symbolically, but at the same time she makes us question the necessity of an age-divided society.