Relative Strangers
New work by Lucy Gibson
April 4th - May 6th 2005

Time does not fall in a straight line. Our minds are woven in a fabric of memories that move in and out of our experience. Past jumps in to present when we least expect it and can re-write the physicality of our existence in any given space.
Lucy Gibson

Having returned to her birthplace after many years away, artist Lucy Gibson has chosen, or was perhaps compelled, to investigate her past in order to understand her homecoming and existence in Leeds.  This journey has become Relative Strangers, a disquietingly beautiful depiction of and inquisition into the workings of our memories within the spaces we occupy. 

Taken from the title of a Channel 5 afternoon film, the naming of Gibson’s series relates to the poles of knowing and unknowing, supporting the work and its intimations about being an adult in the place where the child once grew.  The work, in turn, encourages our development and in its viewing adds layers to our own histories.

Capturing the fluorescent and natural glows of suburban and city landscapes, her camera encapsulates the unravelling and recoiling quality of life.  Shadows thrown from objects ordinary in their wholeness but uncommonly abstract as the light from the outside world dissects them and the experiences within, Gibson’s photographs present a perspective that is both comforting and disrupting – she is able to invoke the reality of the city estate and allude to an Arcadian existence of supernatural quality.

Resonating the contradictory nature of this work, Relative Strangers confronts both the private space within the framework of the photographs and the public space of Brahm Gallery through the installation of the work and its audio elements.  Described by Gibson as ‘isolated narratives… constructed from discarded memories of a middle-class suburban upbringing’ the voices we encounter bleed from the images through a reactive trigger; the closer we physically get to the work, the closer we get to the depths of it.