June 28 - August 9, 2025
West Gallery
Cloven
Tajai Alexev
Open House June 28 - 1 PM to 3 PM
Cloven' is a word that means split hoof. In this context, the analogy of split hoof is applied to all forms of life that unexpectedly face abrupt circumstances of displacement - separated from their norm, bereft of time and skills for adjusting to new realities of life. There is a sense of frailty within these often-unprecedented navigations that drives a sense of compassion. This collection of paintings is predicated on varying themes of displacement that involve humans, cultures, and loss of language; extending to endangered species, pollinators, the incremental tilt of earth's axis, and asteroids nudged out of their orbit - all held in equal regard of importance. Implications of displacement are sometimes obvious, others require in-depth questioning.
When a race or species disappears in the wake we are left with the implications of loss – of human dignity, of the wisdom of predecessors, of language that may leave us stilted to understanding the world in unique and traditional ways, and to considerations of ecological niches unfulfilled within evolutionary trajectories. Are subtle shifts in the earth's axis compromising biodiversity or a finely-tuned habitat? Is our faith in systems of linearity undermined? Is there a compensating operative for the liminal ways we once communicated with other systems?
Synchronous links between human consciousness and land is a theory that lays the groundwork for this work as a format to frame subjects of displacement, to imagine the expressions of their interface. Mycelium is a vast web of interconnecting and receptive tendrils called "hyphae" which are conduits of energetic exchanges communicating life beneath the surface we walk upon, sensing variabilities, possessing memory, seemingly doing nothing more than being a system acutely aware of imbalances and striving to correct them. I question whether mycelium possesses an inherent awareness and sensitivity for experiences beyond that which exist within its physical range. There is a fine line for anthropomorphic tendencies, so I thought to invite the perspective that to regard land as 'alive' is not to personify it, but rather deepening the category of life, enlarging the imagined range of self to move within it and explore its unequivocal force.
Faraj Bayrakdar, a poet within the confines of a Syrian prison, uttered: "Silence may not be enough, but it is self-sufficient." I questioned whether this implied that self-preservation against all odds was in order to maintain self as a beacon of hope for others. Or, by a simpler characterization, the self-sufficiency of silence perhaps exists not as a void but as a liminal state fluctuating between humans and the intelligence of the very land we walk upon.
When Wislawa Szymborska, a poet of Poland, wrote: "Those who knew what was going on here must make way for those who know little and less than little, and finally little as nothing..." There is generous inclusivity revealed in the line "and finally as little as nothing" conveying something like an urgent responsibility to bear witness, to not bury knowledge of specificity of events by agency of the luxury of situational amnesia.
If there is any way to frame displacement, it is by the very land you walk upon, the very shell you inhabit.