Courtesy of the artists and the Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit. Photo by Clare Gatto.
COLLAGE ON VIEW
Swan Song
in Mike Kelley’s Mobile Homestead at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Detroit, Michigan, USA
29 October 2022-26 March 2023
Swan Song features the individual and collaborative work of Halima Afi Cassells and Shanna Merola, combining their photo-based collages alongside sculpture and installation. This exhibition examines the cause and effects of colonization, resource extraction, climate crisis, and corporate domination. While Merola’s dystopian landscapes seem fractured beyond repair by free market deregulation, Cassells work manifests the collective liberation of both people and land from the grip of white heteropatriarchal systems of oppression.
Courtesy of the artists and the Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit. Photo by Clare Gatto.
The swan is a recurring figure, both aesthetically and metaphorically. As an archetype and motif, the graceful creature holds multiple meanings handed down through the centuries and across different cultures. According to ancient Greek mythology, the silent swan sings a beautiful song just before death. As we stand on the precipice of collapse, in the wake of a new paradigm shift, can we also learn to experience beauty and joy amidst the terror?
(text adapted from materials provided by the museum)
INFORMATION
Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit
4454 Woodward Avenue
Detroit, Michigan 48201 USA
(313) 832-8622
Hours for Mike Kelley’s Mobile Homestead:
Thursday-Friday, 11AM-8PM
Saturday-Sunday, 11AM-5PM