ARTIST STATEMENT
The Gaggle
The Gaggle is a drawing that depicts a group of Canada geese and goslings that are bound together and suspended by their own intestines. In various stages of life and death, the geese hang like a large sack of flesh. The demise of the gaggle includes a human presence that twists and squishes the geese together. Yet, the geese also become self-destructive, as they turn cannibalistic and become tangled in their own organs. These attributes are metaphoric for our own self-destructive behaviours; including environmental damage, our obsession with control, and anxiety surrounding mortality.
The scale of The Gaggle is approximately seven feet tall, allowing the geese and goslings to become larger than life-size. This scale lets the geese become monumental and lure the viewer into the underlying details of infected skin, and twisted bodies. My research includes both human and animal dissections, the anatomy of the Canada goose, invasive species (dandelions) and the stages of decay. Throughout the drawing process, I apply this research to a small clay model which replicates the drawing and allows me to physically understand the contorted body in three-dimensional form. It is also an important process that allows me to play with the contrasting roles of the powerful and the innocent. Overall, I create an attraction-repulsion effect within the drawing, by using the unity of monochrome graphite to create a realistic aesthetic which is soft and alluring but contrasts the grotesque subject matter.
When I contort and infest these geese, I explore my ability to empathize for these creatures; and I wonder if as a greater society, we have become desensitized to the suffering of the natural world. Empathy, involves the active feeling of understanding, being sensitive to, and experiencing the feelings taking place in another body. When I begin to twist and tear apart these creatures, it hurts, and I feel empathy. But once I spend time with the image and I illustrate each part of the broken body, I become desensitized. And then I move onto the next figure and start the process all over again. I think it is interesting to understand the fluctuating moments in which I become numb to their stress, sometimes it is at the beginning stages of the drawing and sometimes it is near the end. Overall, I think this process of becoming desensitized to distress, is a common side-effect of media on today’s society. We are consistently surrounded by an immense number of images depicting disasters and unless we are living through those situations, we lose our empathy towards them.
The geese also exhibit self-destructive behaviour. As they interact with each other, they become cannibalistic and tangled within their own body parts. In comparison to the human presence within the drawing, this self-destructive behaviour shifts some of the event’s responsibility onto the geese. I wonder if that fault makes the demise of the gaggle easier to witness. This question relates back to the complexity of empathy and our ability (and inability) to empathize for people who are guilty of their own self-destructive behaviours. Overall, The Gaggle makes viewers bare witness to the questions of empathy, environmental distress, and relations of power.
The Gaggle is a drawing that depicts a group of Canada geese and goslings that are bound together and suspended by their own intestines. In various stages of life and death, the geese hang like a large sack of flesh. The demise of the gaggle includes a human presence that twists and squishes the geese together. Yet, the geese also become self-destructive, as they turn cannibalistic and become tangled in their own organs. These attributes are metaphoric for our own self-destructive behaviours; including environmental damage, our obsession with control, and anxiety surrounding mortality.
The scale of The Gaggle is approximately seven feet tall, allowing the geese and goslings to become larger than life-size. This scale lets the geese become monumental and lure the viewer into the underlying details of infected skin, and twisted bodies. My research includes both human and animal dissections, the anatomy of the Canada goose, invasive species (dandelions) and the stages of decay. Throughout the drawing process, I apply this research to a small clay model which replicates the drawing and allows me to physically understand the contorted body in three-dimensional form. It is also an important process that allows me to play with the contrasting roles of the powerful and the innocent. Overall, I create an attraction-repulsion effect within the drawing, by using the unity of monochrome graphite to create a realistic aesthetic which is soft and alluring but contrasts the grotesque subject matter.
When I contort and infest these geese, I explore my ability to empathize for these creatures; and I wonder if as a greater society, we have become desensitized to the suffering of the natural world. Empathy, involves the active feeling of understanding, being sensitive to, and experiencing the feelings taking place in another body. When I begin to twist and tear apart these creatures, it hurts, and I feel empathy. But once I spend time with the image and I illustrate each part of the broken body, I become desensitized. And then I move onto the next figure and start the process all over again. I think it is interesting to understand the fluctuating moments in which I become numb to their stress, sometimes it is at the beginning stages of the drawing and sometimes it is near the end. Overall, I think this process of becoming desensitized to distress, is a common side-effect of media on today’s society. We are consistently surrounded by an immense number of images depicting disasters and unless we are living through those situations, we lose our empathy towards them.
The geese also exhibit self-destructive behaviour. As they interact with each other, they become cannibalistic and tangled within their own body parts. In comparison to the human presence within the drawing, this self-destructive behaviour shifts some of the event’s responsibility onto the geese. I wonder if that fault makes the demise of the gaggle easier to witness. This question relates back to the complexity of empathy and our ability (and inability) to empathize for people who are guilty of their own self-destructive behaviours. Overall, The Gaggle makes viewers bare witness to the questions of empathy, environmental distress, and relations of power.
