Throne Camel Elephant

This terracotta red throne fuses two bodies into one ergonomic host: an elephant’s mass meets the camel’s stretched profile, as if a fairytale prop had slipped into the logic of furniture. Koerfer’s animal forms carry the shine and charm of decorative figurines, yet they refuse to stay ornamental. The seat is offered, not displayed. Use is part of the work. By inviting contact, the sculpture tests where utility ends, and meaning begins. An everyday action, sitting, becomes a small performance. You occupy the animal, and the animal frames you. The viewer turns into both spectator and actor, noticed by others in the room and by the creature’s watchful silhouette. Nuri Koerfer links these choices to lived encounters: “I choose animals I’d like to sit next to or have had a personal encounter with.” The work proposes kinship as a method, nudging us toward interspecies entanglement, as discussed by Donna Haraway. Its hybrid anatomy operates like a sentence made of gestures, where color, scale, and touch translate care into form and time. It was created for the 7th Athens Biennale, titled “ECLIPSE” (2021).