JeresTragedy Static/Heaven — Imperfections
Opening Event
Tuesday 21st February
6 - 8pm: Reception evening
On View
22 - 27 Feb 2023
4 Cromwell Place, South Kensington
London SW7 2JE
This collection is an expression of finding beauty and hope in this in-between state where things aren’t quite perfect.
In the song Heaven by Talking Heads, heaven is depicted as a bar that everyone is trying to find; a perfect place where they are always playing your favorite song, over and over again ad nauseam. A place where nothing ever really happens and everyone leaves at the same time. In this sarcastic take on bliss, the idea that perfection is static and attainable ultimately makes it a boring, misguided goal.
Another influence is a short story by Mavis Gallant called The Doctor. In the opening paragraph, the world is described as insoluble; a “tragedy static” for people living through the great depression. Nothing could conceivably change, much less improve, so why challenge the status quo? The forfeiture of a people unable to imagine any progress or solution to the broken world they lived in… leading to the abandonment of hope or ambition in any sense.
This dichotomy is interesting because however different these worlds are, they are both presented as something static… undeserving or incapable of change because one is so perfectly “wonderful” and the other so inescapably tragic. Maybe those extremes aren’t all that different.
Jeres
Crisp rectangles at slight angles give the compositions a feeling of potential energy and implied movement that provoke the viewer to shift their perception or assumption of what is desirable or ideal. The impact of any individual element is amplified by creating a tension in how they interact with another. It also uses texture to extend this embrace of imperfection, adding a component of wear that gives them an added dimension of age and character.
Tragedy Static/Heaven is part of the group exhibition Imperfections.
