Eye Lounge is pleased to present How We Were and Other Possibilities, a new exhibition of work by Kat Davis, a member of the downtown Phoenix collective.
The past often comes to us defined. We are introduced to artifacts with a clear timeline of events. Possibilities are provided matter-of-factly given the contexts of culture and time. Historians and archaeologists dictate our pasts—our stories—up to this point. But artifacts we find ourselves aren't always framed with context. Photos found in an antique store shoebox have no narrative. At best we find a date or a couple names scrawled in illegible cursive. This current exploration gives context to these ghosts.
By threading long lost characters in present narratives, they are given new lives and diverse futures. These characters can see the other side of the arc of ambivalent progression. All the while, the past is reimagined. The dimension of time collapses. The present informs the past, and the past discovers the future.
How We Were, and Other Possibilities finds queer relationships lost in time, and introduces them into modern settings. The love rediscovered can be celebrated independently of the traditional and violent history it once belonged. At the same time, this separation makes one consider the violence beyond the frame of these assemblages. While a new reality within which queer love can be considered precious is created, the true and hostile reality within which we live is unmasked.
katdavis.art
Kat Davis uses the medium of photography to explore presentation and performance of individual identity and its relation to social and political boundaries. The addition of found photos and objects adds a new dimension by which Davis can bend the arrow of time to create new histories. In her most recent work, Davis assumes the role of historian and archaeologist, as well as creator and imaginaire, by placing images of queer love among modern settings, allowing audiences to experience this love and passion for what it is, separate from the violent and tumultuous history that would otherwise be inseparable. This work allows Davis to find and affirm the histories of which she dreamt.
Davis’ other projects explore such themes as the empowerment of the feminist identity and its limitations, a couple’s shared sense of identity and its relationship with the people it encompasses, and other ways identity can confine or expand a sense of self.
Davis’ work has appeared in FLOAT, OURS Magazine, Tits and Co., Terra Firma, and other publications, as well as in art spaces on both the east and west coast. She has been a member of the Eye Lounge collective for over a year, while serving as a humble host to a cat named Wasabi.