A C Q U I E S C E N C E 2021
Short film 06:22
exhibited in London, Tokyo, Seoul, Milan, New York, and Los Angeles
/,akwɪˈɛsns/
noun
noun
the reluctant acceptance of something without protest
The adaptability of mankind has been tried and tested throughout the pandemic, as the collective memory of our generation has come to be defined by a singular, overarching, unprecedented phenomenon. The freedom that we have come to enjoy and even take for granted has been stripped away in front of our very eyes, and replaced with a new reality eerily reminiscent of the foreshadowing of Huxley and Orwell.
We have adapted into accepting our fate, and learned to love the carrot and disregard the obvious stick. We have learned that we should trust our government, and we understand in our hearts that the government cannot trust us, the mob. Protest is futile; and unwanted. Change is compulsory; boring. The revolution will not be televised. Everything is the same these days anyway.
We have learned to wait – to be patient; to be proper. Wait for the green light. Even if there’s no one around: wait. Trust.
And so, we wait. In unease; in discomfort. Languishing under the pretense that soon all will be well. Life in its entirety now sugarcoated by the sweetness of nostalgia and hope. No time like the present, indeed. Just float downstream; do not rock the boat. Trust.
Acquiescence is a project that depicts the human experience during the pandemic. It evokes a feeling; a state of being in which our trusted notions of time do not apply anymore. It is a visualisation of the limbo we have been subjected to over the past 20 months: a dominating void filled with the unease of uncertainty and the assurance of futility.
Published: http://circa.art/days/20-oct-2021