My work is at once an account of my years in education, a critique of the education system, and an articulation of the perceived or real tension between theoretical and practical knowledge. Education must be a strong bastion of our society so that we can later transform the knowledge we acquire on the school bench into the competencies we need to thrive. As a young adult about to graduate, however, I felt that the knowledge I had acquired through years of hard work was towering over me like an unstable house of cards, rather than a solid bulwark. Getting my degree made me realize that knowledge is not an attainable goal, but a state of constant construction and decline. Moreover, it is questionable to what extent the curricula required during our studies serve our development: do they become the intellectual nourishment that shapes our personality, the expertise that helps us to thrive, or do they remain an empty data set. It is to express this precarious and unstable state that I have created this installation, a house of cards made up of hundreds of old textbooks, which gives the illusion of a state between construction and collapse. This feeling is reinforced by the colorful scaffolding around it, which formally resonates with the stable supporting pillars of the bastion of books. Through the visual interplay of these two elements, I have tried to show that theoretical knowledge can only be put to good use through practical skills. It is therefore very important that students acquire real competencies rather than a flood of information. However, the Hungarian education system still tends to focus on the quizzing of data rather than on the deepening of knowledge. And instead of developing individual skills, it follows a uniform curriculum. I have tried to illustrate this by using uniformly packaged textbooks with stickers on the booklets, reminiscent of the pre-regime change era.

The scaffolding that encloses the sides of the installation is the size of a playground climbing frame, bridging the gap between childhood and adulthood, play and work. Completing one’s studies is also a change of life stage, a change that can easily lead to a crisis without a solid foundation and knowledge. It is no wonder that the mass of young people starting in recent years is suffering from a quarter-life crisis.