CoExistence (2017)

Curated by Julia Schlosser and Alexandra Murphy as part of the conference Living with Animals Eastern Kentucky University US March

These six images are an excerpt from a performative sequence (see Unreliable/Alice and Unreliable/Peter) based on a visit to the songbird aviary at Jurong Bird Park in Singapore. In the bird park the sign on the path to the aviary reads ‘The illegal capture of songbirds is the sole cause of the decline of many species in South East Asia.’  An appreciation of songbirds is deeply rooted in many South East Asian countries and with increasingly urbanised populations caging birds has become a popular answer for maintaining contact. It is the complex soaring songs of the birds that captivate and immerse listeners, yet the trade is decimating populations in the wild and is on the increase. Using the idea of language as an open structure that continually produces change and renewal, the names of the birds are placed one by one on top of each other becoming increasingly unreadable as the lettering merges and transmogrifies