(be)longing
October 16 - December 19, 2023
Latela Curatorial is honored to present the 4th annual See Support Collect exhibition, which features artwork by 31 artists responding internationally to the theme (be)longing.
Defined as "an affinity for a place or situation", (be)longing represents the human emotional desire/need to take part in something greater than ourselves. Many participating artists shared the interpretation of the human species belonging in nature / to the Earth, and returning to practices of stewardship and conservation. For example, Ashley Condina grounds her body in soil indigenous to her bloodline on Mount Etna in Sicily. Namrata Bhatter imprints paper with foraged plants from her family's ancestral coffee estate in India.
Technology also becomes woven into conversations with the Earth. Through biomorphic metal and plant assemblages, Fanni Somogyi primarily investigates interspecies connections to understand how she affects non-human beings and the ecosystem, and her embedded connection within the lived environment. Andrea Plaza highlights virtualization, human exchanges, and the future of the global economy.
In her Investigation of Home series, Bryanna Millis honors the poetry of Palestinian poet and writer Mahmoud Darwish, and via mixed media collages, reflects the complexity of belonging in the face of exile. Sobia Ahmad references an immigrant's search for home and gives shape to an absence that’s always present for those in exile.
Belonging to one another and within communities is also present. Frances Wertimer explores the way femme-identifying people build community, hold each other sacred, and protect each other. Sasha-Loriene McClain highlights close bonds between young siblings. Katie Venugopal Hobbs captures her daughter's loneliness during the 2022 pandemic lockdowns in China. Solar plate etchings by Terry Svat depict humans linking together, suggesting harmony and community.
Additional perspectives include disabilities, chronic illness, isolation, post-pandemic social (re)assimilation, currency, video games / non-IRL communities, and the preservation of history, ancestry, cultures, and voices. Coexistence, empathy, humanity, unity, alchemy, and love emerge as sub-themes throughout this collection of artworks, which vary in media to include photography, painting, sculpture, works on paper, and mixed media.
Image credits left to right, top to bottom: Ashley Condina, Danyang Song, Fanni Somogyi, Olivia Tripp-Morrow; Sasha-Loriene McClain, Sobia Ahmad, Bryanna Millis and Andrea Plaza.
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See Support Collect (SSC) is an intersectional placemaking and gap-filling initiative that focuses on collectorship of art by women and non-binary artists. Helmed by Latela Curatorial, this initiative began at the start of the pandemic and has taken on a variety of forms each year to include multiple online and IRL exhibitions.