The Wild Project Gallery and Humble Arts Foundation are pleased to present As We Came Together We Will Go Together, an exhibition of photographs by Hannah Whitaker. The show takes its title from the fable of the Biddenden Maids, a set of conjoined twins from the pre-medical 1100s, setting the ton... Read more
The Wild Project Gallery and Humble Arts Foundation are pleased to present As We Came Together We Will Go Together, an exhibition of photographs by Hannah Whitaker. The show takes its title from the fable of the Biddenden Maids, a set of conjoined twins from the pre-medical 1100s, setting the tone for the duality threaded throughout the exhibition. In the myth, when one twin died and it was proposed that they be separated so that the other might live, the surviving sister replied, “As we came together we will go together,” and died shortly after. In these photographs, Whitaker uses patterns and repetition, both naturally occurring and rendered by hand, to investigate the interdependence of opposing halves. The case of the twins exposes the paradoxical rift between scientific understanding and lived experience explored throughout the show—its emotional implications are complex while the math is simple. Her dark, often uncomfortable images, which include mangled trees, snakes, and sword and fire swallowers, challenge conventional sequential logic to explore her interest in the misleading simplicity of visual clarity, and how these serve as metaphors for human anxiety.