2018 Wounds

Wounds

Everyone who is alive, or has ever lived in this world, experiences wounds. Most wounds that we are acutely aware of are personal wounds, whether these be psychological and/or physical. One cannot go through the world without being wounded. All of us experience pain. All of us experience the death of a loved one.

Aside from personal wounds, there are wounds that we witness in the lives of others – a family member, someone who we know, a community wounded by hatred, a nation wounded by war, etc. What do we do when we are wounded, or we see the wounds of others? When we are wounded, we must act immediately to survive or suffer the consequences of not healing ourselves, which includes death. When we witness wounds of others in society and the world, we often feel less urgency to act.

Today, we live in a global community. The media inundates us every day with the wounds of others. As a consequence, we know more about the world around us. Often our own country (in our case the United States) is complicit in wounding others.

What do we do with that information? We can ignore what we know, or we can choose to act. Americans, who choose to act often join organizations, participate in demonstrations, etc. Each person acts from the position of where they are with whatever they have to offer.

Artists, who choose to act, can use their talents as artists to make contributions. The Artnauts Collective chooses to act. We take exhibitions to places of contention where inhumanity has eroded the lives of human beings. Thus, we come to Palestine, as we have for over a decade.