Grand-pianos, churches, boats, airplanes, hay-bundles, pallets; they all serve as a starting point in the work of Jonker and all have a common ground; they’re designed by function.
By chancing materials or by placing his work out of their normal situations a new appreciation of these object occurs. A pallet out of tropical wood becomes a design object, a church made of railroad track becomes history.
In the work “homage to the RIB” (rigid inflatable boat) in which Jonker build a life sized working wooden rubber boat the direction of his approach becomes clearer. Objects designed solely for their purpose will get new aesthetic grounds of existence.
Last summer Jonker build a tugboat out of honeycomb-cardboard, a material mostly used in the packaging industry. Honeycomb-cardboard has excellent strenght, is lightweight and sustainable, the only weakness is; it’s not waterproof.
With the help of a German company specialized in heavy-duty coatings, the cardboard got waterproofed. To proof that this combination was a strong one, Jonker crossed the Channel, being the first boat made out of cardboard to do so and was welcomed on the 7 of sept at Thames festival in London.
