One autumn day, a small squirrel family came across a very special tree. This tree stood twice as tall as the others in the neighborhood, with bark unusually smooth and needles unusually green. It’s towering stature reminded Mrs. Squirrel of the old-growth forests of her youth–a perfect picture of sylvan splendor. She moved her family in promptly.
The squirrels found their new home to be quite convenient. While other trees sagged and severed in winter storms, theirs stood tall and unmoving. When they would leave their nuts in the hollows of the tree, they would return to find them heated, sizzling even. Plus, the cell reception was excellent.
One afternoon, an old owl approached the family forebodingly. He warned that their tree might not be what it seems. He said it came to be in an unusual way: brought in five pieces on huge semi trucks, and assembled with a crane. The tree, which should’ve taken 100 years to grow, manifested in a matter of weeks with the flock of machines and men. He warned the squirrel family that their tree could be demonic.
“I'm sick of his conspiracies!” proclaimed Baby Squirrel.
‘Perhaps our tree is a little odd,’ the squirrels admitted to themselves. ‘It does hum strangely from time-to-time. But no tree is perfect,’ Besides, the squirrels found the white noise to be soothing; it reminded Mrs. Squirrel of the wind blowing through the pines in the forests of her youth. ‘It can’t be demonic,’ the squirrels affirmed to each other.
The owl was a kook, he could never know in any meaningful way the delight of living in their tree. He had never experienced the seductively predictable placement of the branches that allowed one to leap from bough to bough in a trance-like rhythm. He had never been soothed by the cool touch of the trunk on his paws after a long day, or cradled in the buzzing warmth of its hollows at night. The squirrels brushed the old owl off, after all, this was their beloved home he was talking about
Songs of a Decoy features the work of five artists navigating the contemporary West. Using the familiarity of domestic objects, each work serves as both artifact and actor, opening a realm where matter and motifs of history are suspended and reoriented.
In a glass case, bobby pins are entombed in amber resin. Suspended in time like prehistoric specimens, they recall a forgotten dressing table. Nearby, a candle flickers, its flame eerily repetitive, emanating no warmth—only the mechanical imagination of it. A chair displays silicon that masquerades as a log, portraying a moment of its fictional decay.
Each work spins its own allegory–both illuminating and unsettling the forces of simulation, alienation, and nostalgia within this unreality. Employing the surreal and anachronistic, the artists work to reveal the mythologies that shape everyday life.