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ARTY 37: Isolation Chamber Vacation
Autumn / Winter 2016
Whatever your opinion on the question of time spent alone, one thing is for sure, you will have one. Every individual sits somewhere on the introvert/extravert spectrum, either drained or energised by the experience of being with others. Journalists, academics and scientists have all weighed in on topics such as the effects of loneliness on the brain, the rise of living alone, the isolating potential of the internet. Paradoxically, this research project on the meaning of ‘aloneness’ works best when multiple voices are added to the conversation.
Should we be alone? What are the benefits? Do they outweigh the costs? Is there a difference between achieving aloneness and having it thrust upon you? There’s certainly a stigma to ‘ending up alone,’ but is it worse if you were desperately trying to avoid it? We’re supposed to learn to love ourselves before we enter into relationships with others, but once that relationship goal is met, what happens to our self love? Is solitude selfish? Is it safe? Will we die alone?
I began researching this subject in the year that I lived in a cramped room with a boyfriend, read Susan Cain’s Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World that Can’t Stop Talking, and saw Paris, Texas (1984) for the first time, envying the man who hadn’t spoken to another soul in four years. During this time, solitude was my main fantasy. After years of collecting the words, images, sounds and objects associated with solitude, this preoccupation eventually became an exhibition, Isolation Chamber Vacation, at Transition Gallery. In this issue the artists who feature in the show, and other interested parties, pick apart and present their own stances on the state of aloneness.
Sarah Kathryn Cleaver
Guest Editor
September 2016
    
The artist / contributors to Arty Isolation Chamber Vacation are... Kirsty Buchanan, Juno Calypso, Sarah Kathryn Cleaver, Annabel Dover, Hannah Ford, Nina Mae Fowler, Nicola Frimpong, Susie Hamilton, Katerina Jebb, Paul Kindersley, Cathy Lomax, Alli Sharma and Anna Stothard.
They look at... Blanche Dubois, Solaris, Alain de Botton, annotated books, Under the Skin, Edward Hopper, widows, de Chirico, bed, The Outsider, Marquis de Sade, Greta Garbo, sex dolls, pink, Blue Jasmine, keepsakes, Salvador Dali, dreams, Lost in Translation, fame, Henry Darger, moving home, solitude, Walden, Morvern Callar...
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