The Poetics of Space
Curated by Seoyoung Kim, Jaesun Myung, and Sophia Shin
Memorial Hall, Providence RI
2022. 10. 25. – 11. 04.
Hamza Ahmad
Soeun Bae
Laney Day
Seoyoung Kim
Yingshuet Lam
Stephanie Ling
Beth Nguyen
Theju Nimmagada
Georgie O’Brien
Andrew Shea
Sophia Shin
Scott Vander Veen
Chenxi Wang
Gage Wenderski
Space holds the power to unlock the potential of form - as form searches for the potential of space to be found. Space has been defined in many ways; from understanding space as an absolute and given, to framing the idea through experience. Not only is it impossible to give one true definition of space, but it is also meaningless to define as there could never be one universal definition; We attempt to unlearn our “space”, to redefine what role it holds in the act of gathering.
The title of this show comes from the celebrated French philosopher Gaston Bachelard’s book The Poetics of Space. Bachelard considers dreams - the oneiric space, and the unconscious as inhabited spaces beyond geometric forms. Consciousness can be understood as a tool to navigate physical space, and form as a language for us to perceive the physicality of space. In a rereading of Bachelard today, it is the interrelationship between space and form that allows us to understand space without the context of form.
Our unlearning takes place in our perception and perspective. Austrian poet Rainer Maria Rilke remarks that space expresses our relations to things: as we form a relationship to objects, space enters our minds as an expression of the object.
“Space reaches from us and construes the world: to know a tree, in its true element, throw inner space around it, from that pure abundance in you. Surround it with restraint. It has no limits. Not till it is held in your renouncing is it truly there.” - Maria Rainer Rilke
The Poetics of Space invites you to rebuild, reinvent and reimagine the triangular relationship between form, space, and viewership. Considering the non-universal nature of the definition, this exhibition aspires to be a gathering for artists to redefine ( ) and the viewers to realize ( ).
︎︎︎ ︎︎︎
