The Drawers - Daphne Gerou   Commentary written by Julie Oakes

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Situation, Positioning, Location

With the dark simplicity of graphite where the eraser has cast a glow of unearthly significance on the scene, Daphne Gerou's implied narratives bridge the genres of fantasy and reality. The dark depictions make a quantum leap from cute to ominous. The uniformed bunnies' passive expressions, their lack of identifiable differences, their cool personalities (or are they only timid?) set up a dynamic of menace. It is not the seething rage of horror about to pounce, but an insidious suspicion of the irrevocably unjust situation that the less demonstrative species are caught in by virtue of modernity and industrialization. It's not only the hunted amongst the animals, but the hunters are also upset and prowling. Wolves course through the woods or skulk along the beach, instinctually cautioned and aware of the impending necessity to change their natural ways and morph to fit the surely imminent apocalypse.

Even the lights in the cottage seem feeble and defenseless, the railway now deserted, outmoded or only unoccupied until the next rush of noise and pollution spills over onto gentility. Like the family in the forest, held captive by robbers in the Grimm's fairy tale “The Musicians of Bremen”, the animals are watching the plight of humanity and scheming a way to balance the wrongs.

There is not hopelessness in the vista, however. The bunnies are outfitted and naturally silent, they appear organized in their bid to adjust their dilemma. But their uniforms are more like a child's, a boxy fresh cut, and their weapons appear plastic and surreal. “Would that, could that” gentle fluffy white bunny ever shoot anything? The logical response - “not here, not there, not anywhere.”

Yes, the bunnies are on the move - as are the wolves and the beaver. They are leaving in the dead of night like refugees exiting an occupied zone. They are navigating by signs that are foreign to their habitual naturalism. The bunnies are glowing in the dark as if they had eaten radioactive fodder. Uniformed, armed and signaling to far distant bunnies, they are migrating strategically. The bunnies have apparently discovered something that mankind hasn't quite grasped yet - that there is an imbalance - “the time is out of joint”. They are educated bunnies and have read the signs. All are environmentally threatened, the beasts and man, alike. The lights are on in the little cottage in the woods, but the occupants have been trussed by their own demise.

Copyright © 2006,  Headbones Gallery, The Drawers