In Feeling: Empathy and Tension Through Disability features works by nine contemporary artists that examine how we empathize—the practice of being sensitive to, understanding, or experiencing the feelings and thoughts of another. Yet the practice of empathizing can also engender tensions relating to one’s own position and expectations. Exploring the relationship between empathy and tension through lived experiences of disability, this exhibition highlights and celebrates perspectives that challenge assumptions about ways of being and living.
Liza Sylvestre’s Interference 7/26/21 (2021), for example, is from her ongoing series of handwritten words on a sheet of paper that have been obscured. The redacted parts of each word correspond to parts of speech she cannot hear due to hearing loss. Sylvestre is interested in the visual pattern of this “loss” but is also interested in the idea of the “loss” hiding and protecting information that is private within the public space of an art exhibition.
In addition to Sylvestre, participating artists include JJJJJerome Ellis, Jerron Herman, Molly Joyce, Jeff Kasper, Christine Sun Kim, Park McArthur, Finnegan Shannon, and Andy Slater.
Curated by Molly Joyce, Dean’s Doctoral Fellow, Department of Music at UVA, and Kristen Nassif, Ph.D., Curator of Collections at The Fralin Museum of Art.
Image: Liza Sylvestre (b.1988). Interference 7/26/2021, 2021. Ink on paper, 18 x 24 in. (45.7 x 61 cm). Courtesy of the artist. © Liza Sylvestre.
A sheet of off-white paper pinned to a wall, densely filled with small, irregular black ink marks resembling dots, dashes, and fragments of handwriting. The markings are arranged in a grid-like pattern, suggesting the format of written text, but are largely illegible, evoking a sense of obscured or lost communication.
