PATRICIA
With this very ancient, golden and round mirror, I felt I was allowed to look at the rooms, with an eye which was the same age as John's House and just as noble and old - a mirror that had already seen a whole life of reflections, and now was receiving this house's inner colors.

I come from a very young country and continent, and our idea of time is very different. Our houses are considered old much earlier than English or European houses. Aging is a matter of decades, not centuries. Maybe through this respectable mirror, I would be able look at the inner spaces with eyes which are the same age as the house - over 200 years old. It means there was to be more than a sense of belonging to the place, because the mirror is the same age as the house, and so it helps me to look at it in a much closer way than I would ever be able to do otherwise.

ARIANE
Have you ever thought that by carrying this mirror into a man's house, you are really doing something even more subversive? Since Grecian times, the mirror - speculum - has been the way of medically investigating women's bodies and their innermost secret chambers which can not otherwise be seen. For me, there's a sense that with your speculum you are turning this tradition inside out, and the body of John's house is the place where this happens. Here a man is caught in the mirror's speckled reflection, leading to speculation as to who he is and where he has come from...


PATRICIA
I think you are right. The curved surface, the distortions, the rounded shape, all transformed the masculine lines into very feminine curved ones. I like the idea of this transformation of the gender of the house through the look, the pictures, the reflections - the possibility of seeing the masculine stone house through these strong and present colors, giving each room a personality, a possibility, a new relation with the light.