Ingrid Heynderickx is professor of Applied Visual Perception and Dean of the Department of IE&IS. From her work desk in the lounge of her home in Geldrop she has a good view of her garden, where, as she has discovered, all kinds of birds make an appearance throughout the day. “I normally spend fifty to sixty hours a week at TU/e. So obviously I've been missing plenty of what goes on in my garden. Like the tits that are busy with their nests and courting each other, which sometimes involves some MeToo-like scenes.” There are doves and jays to be seen every day, and some less common visitors as well. “Last week I saw a hawfinch and a blackcap. I have to reach for my bird guide on those occasions because I'm not really a birdwatcher.”

Even before she started working from home out of necessity, she managed to snap a kingfisher in her garden - sitting on a statue. Right here in an residential neighborhood in Geldrop. “But I do live on the edge of the municipality, quite close to the motorway actually, but we have heathland and meadows close by. The garden is full of nooks and secret corners and has a water course running through it; that definitely helps. Lots of birds come and bathe.”

The dean spends days on end in meetings she attends via her laptop, she says, always with her telephoto lens within reach. “Even during a meeting I'll sometimes stand up for a moment and take a couple of photos. If the camera is off and the microphone is on mute, the others in the meeting don't notice anything.”

Online meetings

The countless meetings, many of which Heynderickx chairs in her capacity as Dean, constantly run into one another. “I must admit I find it quite hard going; there's not even that moment of peace when you relocate from one meeting room to another. I am quite concerned about my people, too. First of all they had to convert all their teaching to online within the space of a week, then straight after that they had the exams.” And on top of this, truth be told, students are expecting us to inject a bit of variety in quartile 4 in order to make online education less boring for them. “I am getting more and more signals that my people are under a great deal of pressure, partly because work and private lives are becoming really very intertwined.”

This is something she herself is experiencing. “I'm trying to turn it around a little with the help of my photography. Trying to bring a little bit of my private life into my work. That way, despite everything, I can draw something positive from the current situation.”