communing communities

These past few months of quarantine have put us in a limbo, cocooned in isolated bubbles of our own construction.

In the warped experience of quaran time our world cracks open under the collective baggage and burden of racism, scarcity fears and too many what-ifs to this pandemic. We are stunned and surprised by what comes crawling out of the dark.

Fallen tree in forest, Haukkamäki District, Jyväskylä by Tiia Monto

"If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?" ~ George Berkeley

Do public spaces serve their purpose if there are no people who come to occupy it? With thousands of objects on display but no one to view them, are places museums or mere storage units? Does beauty exist with no one to view it?

In isolation, how do we share a moment? When we share no space together yet share our private moment in public online, does it mean we had a shared moment?

Sharing online is like stepping into a void or vacuum. Until we get a response or reply, how do we know we connected?

Milky Way Galaxy photo by Karthik Ak

Where does the money come from to make or buy great art? Who pays the artist to devote their lives to what they create? What interaction transpires and how are they each affected?

When corporate millions buy art and donate them to museums as tax shelters, communities still benefit from the beauty on display.

Oil and gas companies rape and ruin the planet yet set up foundations to do good. Weapons and tear gas manufacturers perpetuate wars and repel refugees who seek to escape the hell created.

A family owned business creates a worldwide opioid addiction by putting doctors and lawmakers in their pockets. Even the Vatican is filled with valuable treasures looted throughout the ages from countless crusades funded by the church in the name of civilizing heathens and savages.

“Far from becoming less elitist, ever-more-popular museums have become vehicles for the mass-marketing of elite tastes and practices.” ~ Andrea Fraser, Artforum 2005 

Stefano Mazzola / Awakening / Getty Images

Online, we look more traveled, more cultured, more inclusive than ever before. Yet we are increasingly manipulated and monopolized by social media platforms, algorithms, or their paying sponsors. 

We believe we are more progressive as we troll and scroll unbound and anonymous through the ethernet. Greedily gobbling up anything of interest in as wide a dragnet as we can fling out into this illusionary world. 

Our colonized selves swim like big fish in isolated ponds, growing more parochial. Deluding ourselves virtually and losing touch with what is real and what really matters. We may have lost our culture of communing as communities.