Exhibition: the problem is, a human is only this big (immersive virtual exhibition)
Gallery: Yeah Totally Ltd
Opening:
virtual exhibition available here: Yeah Totally - 28 April 2022, 17.30 (UK time)
physical (screening preview and Q&A), attend here: Way Out East Gallery (London), 28 April 2022, 17.30 -20.30 (UK time)
Ends: June 06th 2022
Note: You can access the virtual space through your desktop computer, mobile device (recommended) or using a VR headset supported by Mozilla Hubs.
“‘The universe is one being. Everything and everyone is interconnected through an invisible web of stories. Whether we are aware of it or not, we are all in a silent conversation. Do not harm. Practice compassion. And do not gossip behind anyone’s back - not even a seemingly innocent remark! The words that come out of our mouths do not vanish but are perpetually stored in infinite space, and they will come back to us in due time. One man’s pain will hurt us all. One man’s joy will make everyone smile.’
From Shams-i Tabrizi’s Forty Rules of Love”
Quoteception or quoting the quote:
Opening quote from Gabriel Santamarina’s curatorial text, written for the hybrid exhibition (virtual and physical) hosted by Yeah Totally
This April 28, 2022 we will be opening the hybrid exhibition titled "the problem is, a human is only this big". This group exhibition is based on a text commissioned to the Mexican psychoanalyst Gabriel Santamarina by Yeah Totally Ltd (UK), a virtual and immersive gallery leaded by Keef Winter and Naiden Hadjiev, both curators of the exhibition and builders of the virtual space in which it is hosted.
In their own words:
“Virtual Design Studio Yeah Totally Ltd hosted a book club during lockdown curated by psychoanalyst Gabriel Santamarina. We since asked him to write a short text (attached) about three sacred spaces, which he described as; a 13th Century Mosque, a 9th Century Buddhist Temple and a Cave. Yeah Totally Ltd then translated his text into a virtual architecture and invited 12 artists to show their digital works in it. This is now ready to launch both virtually and with a physical touchdown on the April 28th 5-8pm. There will be an artist Q&A at 7pm online and in-person for all who can join us at University East London Docklands Campus, E16 2RD. On the 28th April anyone, anywhere, will be able to enter the gallery via: https://www.yhtotally.com/human, to socialise, meet other visitors and navigate artist's work in a custom designed environment.”
Taken from Yeah Totally Instagram account (@yeahhtotally)
Here you can read the original curatorial text by Gabriel Santamarina:
‘The universe is one being. Everything and everyone is interconnected through an invisible web of stories. Whether we are aware of it or not, we are all in a silent conversation. Do not harm. Practice compassion. And do not gossip behind anyone’s back - not even a seemingly innocent remark! The words that come out of our mouths do not vanish but are perpetually stored in infinite space, and they will come back to us in due time. One man’s pain will hurt us all. One man’s joy will make everyone smile.’ From Shams-i Tabrizi’s Forty Rules of Love
There is a space where every single object that occupies it, is conscious of its existence, interacting consciously with its surroundings, with the neighboring objects and with the void itself.
Eventually, every object dwelling here utters pleasure or discomfort, and such utterances stretch into the past and future, thus multiplying with their images into worm-tunnels that are thrown to infinity, proving that every single speck of the universe is conscious; every single speck gives us a never-ending lesson of Love of a Universe that is One living being, throbbing forever.
Three different scenes simultaneously share the same space, interpenetrating the movement that transports them.
The first scene consists of a maze of tunnels, a myriad of caves and niches entirely made of gems and precious stones that issue a blazing light. Most of them are white, but occasionally one finds a red one, or a violet one. They seem to multiply themselves exponentially like cells of a highly evolved being, whose head and face remain forever concealed, but whose intimate reflection is projected everywhere nonetheless.
The tunnels and niches vibrate in perfect unison. Each one of them can be seen as ancient, living beings that do not need luminous energy from the sun, since every single particle of them is an everlasting source of loving light, even the particles that dwell in the seemingly empty space. So the whole maze throbs endlessly with a rhythm that expresses the eternal music of the spheres. If one behold and plunge into the niches, their walls will turn into delicate hands with long and sharp fingernails like needles, also made of jewels. These faceless hands of extreme luxury entices the careless psychonaut into the abyss of oblivion. Be careful.
The second scene is somehow opposite to the first one in its simplicity, but it resembles in its infinite expansion, displaying the same essential nature. It depicts a humble mosque from 13th century Persia, occupied by a group of young and sexless humans, without gender, practicing an extremely austere form of spirituality, devoid of any charismatic excess. Silence reigns, and such stillness is the vehicle that multiplies the image of those faithful, dark-skinned humanoids into infinity. The mosque is just a stone box that hosts the fervor of these human-like entities, and through their unwavering faith they are multiplied into infinity, reaching the realm of Sacred Timelessness.
The third interpenetrating scene shows the secret life and consciousness of inanimate objects. The secret organisation and high strangeness of empty space. The complexity of the void. Long-forgotten, broken and humble plastic toys from the early 1970’s fill the space, expressing intimate feelings and emotions and their secret relationships among them, the unrevealed movements of their souls, unseen by human eyes. A major revelation that tells us of the hidden consciousness of inanimate matter. Their worn-out faces discreetly whine, complaining over and over again: “I’m uncomfortable!”, “What am I doing here?”, “Why do I still exist?”... forever. Fading, unfashionable colours, shapes and designs belonging to a forgotten fashion. The secret and unrequited love for human beings who forsook them. They are kept in a Buddhist temple built in the 8th century Kyoto, preserved forever by nameless monks eternally devoted to the care of their anonymous souls. Only those self-effacing monks know about their existence. The temple (which extends to all the corners of the universe) is filled from the floor to the ceiling with those decaying toys, whose souls will live forever.
These three scenes occupy the same space, being transparent and empty, penetrating each other. Spectral bodies, just like all the seemingly solidity of the universe. Such emptiness displays a strangeness more complex than the throbbing mazes inside the human brain.
Gabriel Santamarina
Honestly, I don’t have much to comment, what can one say in front of beauty?, by the most, that each section of the text reminds me of a section of my work, and this makes me think that they come from the same mother, the same substance from which we all come from.
The opening quote reminds me of a work (more like just a sketch) that I made for my dear friend Santiago Luis-Castillo on his birthday. The work is named La Eternidad and I had it in my mind for a while after a talk by Carl Hayden Smith about the manifestation of the eternal during the psychedelic state caused by DMT.
Regarding the first space, the tunnel and cave maze, I think about the inorganic beings that Carlos Castaneda documents, and about the lifeforms that are not understandable for the human being. It reminds me of the Exoskeletons, who are suspended between the living and the non-living, that are ruin and organism at the same time, that are harmless and lethal too.
The Mosque and their asexual habitants remind me the vision of La Ciudad de los Inmortales. The immortality concept of Borges, to the copulation, the mirrors and the awareness of death as the abominable that makes us mortal individuals. In the city of the immortal there is no death, but life is a suspension that lacks emotions, guts and spiritual wars. What are there, are suspended beings in their own contemplative existence.
At last, there is the temple in which there are conscious unanimated objects. What kind of consciousness is that? I remember that once I happened to be and live as a cartoon. I was a yellow, two-dimensional being, comical and repetitive; my consciousness was limited to know that I was an animated cartoon that inhabited a chapter that was repeating over and over, my only purpose was that, the vertigo of the repetition used to trigger questions about the uncomfortable and purpose, but in the end, I knew that my existence was limited to repeat the few seconds of animation that corresponded me, and that will be forever in that edge on the universe.
The conscious object has a dilemma with two options leading to perfection: to nullify completely their consciousness or to turn themselves into gods.
Ok so, I hope you can join to this exhibition from wherever you are, and share the virtual space with us, wander through its eternal and melancholic halls and, maybe, share a digital “cheers!”.
When you come, be on the look for an Exoskeleton inhabiting the space, and an orbiting meteorite/satellite called Stella and Voyager.
"the problem is, a human is only this big" Virtual + Physical Group Exhibition April 28th - June 06th 2022 based on a commissioned text by Gabriel Santamarina (MX) + curated by Yeah Totally Ltd Touchdown at Way Out East Gallery, University East London Private View 5-8pm (UK time) Enter @ yhtotally.com Artists: Daryl Brown (UK) Manuela Johanna Covini (MX) Nayden Hadzhiev (BG) Jaimie Henthorn (US) Khaoula B. Karaweigh (MA) Selecta LDN (UK) Victor Perez-Rul (MX) Parisa Oreizi (IR) Johnston Sheard (UK) Ayesha Singh + Misael Soto (IN) Daniel Widrig (DE) Keef Winter (IE)
See you, space cowboys
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