Kitchen Drawer Gallery
This iteration of Kitchen Drawer Gallery took place in Chicago in the winter of 2024. The host didn’t have room in their kitchen, but they had a bathroom drawer they weren’t using. I travelled to install the work, bringing supplies with me and finishing everything on site. When I arrived, the host apologized that the bathroom wasn’t clean, and that there was clipped hair in the spare drawer. Our conversation was whispered, because a toddler was sleeping in the next room. I assured her that this was all fine. This was, actually, the whole point. She didn’t have to change anything at all.
While I was installing, the sleeping toddler woke up and came to see what I was doing. His twin brother bounded into the room, and they started to fight over a tea light candle I had brought. I convinced them to put the candle into the gallery. Then I closed the top, turned on the gallery lights, and completed the installation. It was titled ‘Perforated Cosmos’ – both because of its use of perforated paper, and because of the twins’ love of space.
The installation contained five viewing portals, each presenting a different perspective on the perforated cosmos within. Some looked like blurry planets seen through a telescope, others like runway lights viewed through a plane portal. The hosts’ children saw the installation as a grouping of planets, asking which one was Mercury. The juxtaposition between the installation and the bathroom created an otherworldly, surreal feeling.