TIES AND KNOTS AND BANDAGES
Krone Couronne, Bienne
28 October – 3 December 2022

Taking care of others. Taking care of oneself. Alone. Together. Together alone. Part of a whole.

Therefore, in the context of overproduction, anxiety, burn-outs, saturation, the demand for more self-care but also collective care have increased. Author Audre Lorde suggests in her text A Burst of Light, “caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it’s self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare”. Lorde makes a distinction between the individualisation of care as an attribute to one’s personal well-being, and care as a means of survival, a practice of deeper introspection for the sake of mutuality and reciprocity. The latter acts on a more abstract level, it is a tool of knowledge, necessary to overcome injustice and position one’s subjectivity in the framework of communal effort. This dichotomy in principles lies at the core of TIES AND KNOTS AND BANDAGES.

Care is an antidote to violence. Seen as an act of reciprocity and a practice of introspection, care enables ways to challenge the dictatorship of viral capitalism ruled by growth through destruction, productivity through extraction, progress through extinction, and profit through exhaustion. It frees up possibilities for collectively imagining, practising, feeling, thinking and dreaming of modes of coexistence.

The exhibition features the pictorial work of Céline Ducrot in dialogue with silicone sculptures by Vanessa Safavi, the whole blending in an immersive soundscape by Franziska Koch. Between tension and relaxation, TIES AND KNOTS AND BANDAGES reflects upon questions of individual and collective well-being, projecting the body as a container for personal histories, physical or emotional trauma, as well as cultural heritage.

Take care.

Photos by Thalles Piaget