we bled on the grass but we didn’t wake – Saskia Bunce-Rath
In Saskia Bunce-Rath’s new post-humanity world, unfamiliar landscapes are splashed with vivid colour and animalistic figures. She presents half-formed, regenerating worlds in which the figures are forging fresh spiritual connections to the land. Each artwork explores the world post collapse of human civilisation, building on a shared mythology.
To Bunce-Rath however, this is a hopeful future. Brilliantly contrasted thread lifts from the wall. Everything is undulating, moving. The embroidery thread she uses is lively, pulling and pushing the compositions through her variations in colour, length and weight. Dotted details, like sparks or constellations, peek through the surface inviting us in.
Accompanying this exhibition Bunce-Rath has written a short piece (peresented here on the cover) layered with mysterious allegorical language and complex meanings. Like the titles, this writing is an essential companion. She asks us to place ourselves within the works and wander through the worlds.
Accompanying text by Saskia Bunce-Rath
The snow dogs plume down from the sky and eat away all of the grasslands where the smallest gem people live in their quiet homes // the dogs roam the earth in giant white swathes // they eat away at it all // sometimes I see them sleeping on the very tops of the dry yellow hills that encroach on the horizons of the empty city // they are snow and we are snow // we try and catch them in our heavy palms // we are white with it // I say to you that we are brave to be wondering in this particular universe // where the sun is so small // I keep three knives hidden by my ribcage // just in case // and when I am reincarnated I charge into the black empty sky and live where the world is quiet and my neighbours are only gas giants light years away // and I dare you to touch me here // where all the particles are quiet and the softest shades of purple.
