Minding the Gap

“The Gap” is an aural odyssey, inviting guests on a narrated journey that navigates through intimate experiences of rupture and separation in an attempt to understand the ways we deceive ourselves and enchant through virtual connectivity and its discontents. 

Water scarcity has featured prominently in my academic research as an element that has inspired collective action through artistic expression and dynamic sociality, facilitating by its absence intimate relationships and communal solidarity. The abundance of water has appeared in my personal life, as a body that has physically separated and a deluge that has washed out the stable and expected, exposing the fragility of long-distance intimacy and the misplaced discomfort of solitude. Adapting to either condition means recognizing our vulnerabilities in the face of change, examining our relationships to others and ourselves, and accepting our inability to control a moving current. 

Through the aural medium, I have avoided the materially visual to explore the mental imagery evoked through language and the listener’s imagination. With this piece, I invite guests to envision the many forms and feelings this fluid force can inhabit in the slippery construction of our desires, our futures, and the horizons with which we orient ourselves. 

About the Artist

Mariam Abazeri wades between visual media, poetry, and environmental science.