Emmergence

Exhibition Statement

Emergence is an exhibition that explores the interior vistas of the human body now visible through technological portals. Delving deeper into the physical body does not reveal the essence of human consciousness or the soul, yet the search remains a mystical journey.

Inspired by Hazrat Inayat Khan’s essay Music of the Spheres, which recounts an ancient Eastern myth by the 13th-century Persian poet Rumi, the story describes the first union of the body and soul. According to the myth, the soul was lured into the body to hear the resonance of the universe, allowing the body to feel and tune into this cosmic music through the soul's presence.

Reflecting on this myth, I became intrigued by the subtext implying a time when the body existed without a soul and the soul’s initial reluctance to sacrifice its freedom to experience sound. This exhibition stems from my contemplation of how the body feels—whether harmonious or dissonant—about being inhabited by the soul in the absence of music.

Spiritual and health concepts often aspire to free the soul from the body's prison. Conversely, the artworks in this exhibition consider moments when the body is freed from its containing shell and its unbalanced relationship with the soul. Over time, our ability to hear the harmonizing cosmic music seems to have diminished, replaced by noise—both auditory and psychological. These artworks aim to evoke the emergence of these invisible states of being, akin to experiencing the elusive Music of the Spheres.

[1] Kahn, Hazrat-Inayat “Music of the Spheres.”  The Mysticism of Sound and Music: The Sufi Teachings of Hazrat Inayat Kahn. Boston, MA: Shambhala Publications, 1991. 11-20.