Artists Trygve Ohren and Charlotte Rostad are behind an extensive artwork consisting of several fields of porcelain tiles, integrated into the sound barriers in the school's outdoor areas. A larger section – a total of 176 handmade tiles – is embedded in the concrete wall by the bicycle parking. During production, the artists worked at both Porsgrunds Porselænsfabrik and Kunsthall Grenland, and the work clearly bears the mark of this collaboration. Remnants from the porcelain factory have been reused in several of the tiles, which were also fired at the factory, and the artists have also used concrete bricks from the facade at Nordre gate 12 in Trondheim.
Each tile is decorated by hand with cobalt blue motifs – everything from landscape formations, man-made structures, insects, plants and animals, to mythical figures, human figures and fragments of text. The references are numerous and open to interpretation, and the viewer is invited to explore layers upon layers of meaning over time. The title of the work, "if you stand on the planet you probably won't notice anything," addresses the public directly and raises the question: What is it that we won't notice?
The tiles show people pointing or looking up at the sky, an oil platform on the horizon, an animal drinking water, a bee resting in a hand. Some landscapes appear to be affected by drought, others are flooded. The main motif in the concrete wall shows a woman and a man looking up with serious expressions, surrounded by a landscape where boats lie stranded – perhaps a dried-up sea?
The detailed motifs, executed in cobalt blue, may evoke associations with one of Porsgrund's most iconic patterns, Bogstad Strå – often referred to as the "eternity pattern" and considered one of the world's oldest porcelain patterns. Although each tile can be experienced as a separate image, the work can also be read as a larger narrative, almost like a graphic short story. At the same time, the viewer is free to create their own reading, without a specific beginning or end.
