Hybrid, 2016
Dimensions: 457cm x 213cm
Created from recycled silver foil insulation, marine plywood and timber.
Exhibited as part of the arts trail at Electric Picnic 2016 and Body and Soul Music Festival 2017.
‘Hybrid’ is the forming of two entities. It represents a belief in the fundamental unity of everything and the desire to not be restrained by definitions.
Through interaction, a new creature can be awakened. You can be transformed into another being; your inner self can soar upwards, evoking feelings of endless possibilities, growth and power. For a moment, Imagination and reality blend to become one.
The evolution of this piece saw the addition of a skull placed front of the wings. This delved into the ideas of the hybridisation of spirit and matter. The inevitable fact of death sets these two components in an ever spinning union. We seek to live but the body is made to decompose.
Amongst meaningful symbols I placed a quote by the (death obsessed) philosopher Soren Kierkegaard “Life can only be understood backwards but it must be lived forwards.” This quote, for me, highlights how slippery the mystery of human existence really is and how it can never really be understood; It is in constant movement.
Life is therefore fundamentally unintelligible. You cannot employ rational ways of thinking, to try and understand it.
Life is a paradoxical union of opposites. We cannot remain in reflection and we cannot live a life of pure unthinkable action. We are faced with reflection and action simultaneously and we are stuck oscillating between the two. There is no sense to be had, so just roll with it and try to enjoy the ride.
The skull is a collection of ideas surrounding how we live our lives through emotions, education, experience and our own forms of spirituality.
Rachel Kiernan 
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