What is familiar?

Or, at least, what has society taught us to hold on to?

What drives us?

We are propelled to excel, pushed to compete, to outdo one another. Our icons are Stars, Leaders, The Beautiful, The Powerful - those who have reached the pinnacle of society. Our worth is measured against our heroes, and may the strongest prevail. Bigger, better, faster, stronger, prettier, sexier, smarter… But where is the organic in this constructed collective conscious?

“There is a modern trend in art and journalism to push shock value in order to make a statement. As if tragic world events have numbed something of the human spirit, it is as if artists have to work harder, to force a response out of a viewer. But the superficial response is quickly forgotten. The subtle, subliminal reaction is one that lingers in the mind long after.”

Is it harder than ever to make individual judgments, when certain visual triggers pull on our sensitivities like a magnet? What if my window to the world is also the window to my own soul? Is there time to evaluate my own perceptions, in a world where to hesitate is to risk? So challenging to choose a path outside of the neatly laid stepping stones set out for us. Easier - safer - to stick to split-second instinctive decisions we all understand.

The Unbearable Lightness of Seeing offers a new perspective. What is beautiful, and who is not? What is value, what is valued? Who should be discarded and who should be idolized?

A journey through the exhibition echoes Gordon Clark’s journey in creating it.

Five subjects. Five stories. Diverse, unrelated, yet sharing distinct unifying factors…

Traditions from around the world speak of the Familiar.
A daemon soul mate, an animal twin. A kinship of spirit, interdependent…
Of those who have chosen to be defined by their spirit counterparts rather than social convention. Of those connected to an immediacy of living. Those who have embraced, a vitality and nobility in a bond deeper than the fragile strands into which the modern world is woven.

Five stories, five subjects, who have chosen to shape their own environments. Five who refused to bend to the rules, chosen not to live inside the boundaries built for them… Outsiders, by choice? But are they? Or are they perhaps the only ones with the right idea? Has something bigger chosen them? Have they connected with something most of us have lost? Beware the unknown. Beware the unfamiliar…

But what is familiar?