- Lucas Ondak
Artists: Ashley Michelle Hannah, Colton Rothwell, Hannah Rose Stewart, and vvxxii
The word “gast” is a shapeshifter. Etymologically speaking, it bears the weight of many definitions: In Gothic, gast is an unexpected guest, a stranger. In Old French, it is a barren region, a blighted environment, a waste. In Old English, a ghost, a demon, a warning. Finally, in modern English, it is a verb. To frighten. To terrify.
Using both the antique and contemporary definitions of gast as a guiding framework, this group show explores how fear manifests in environments due to violence remembered, often as collective and individual traumas. Though the art in this exhibition takes on many forms—from analog photography to amorphous paintings—each considers relationships between memory, invisible histories, personal and collective hauntings, and physical landscapes. The work of these artists calls on people to look closely: to put themselves in front of fear and sit with it.
