Grand Rapids-based artist, Shannon Mack, joins us for a year-long corridor exhibition. Throughout the year, we’ll see these works change, grow, and share important messages.

Spring Exhibit, Re-Wild:
I am born. I cry, I laugh, I scream, I dance, I scribble, I fall, I jump, I swing, I build, I run at full speed, I roll down hills, I knock on friends’ doors, I grow. Watching, learning, analyzing, mimicking, I begin to move in pre-prescribed ways. I must be pleasant, accommodating, outgoing, self-sacrificing, gentle, agreeable, practical, appropriate, clever, inoffensive, approachable, high-achieving, humble, available, tolerant, strong; perfect. Above all, I must play along.

I explore the question, “what if I don’t?” and live into the answer. As I take a left turn from my “regular” life, I try gardening. This series is an expression of the joy and freedom of shedding these expectations I’ve accumulated for myself within the many environments that have invariably imprinted on me.

Reacquainting with the earth, soil, sun and sweat on my skin, I begin to seemingly forget my anxieties. The simple beauty of a lotus flower just before it blooms is better than netflix. Laughing so hard my stomach hurts with a friend, both of our hands in the soil, restores my soul. Rain on my face, holding a praying mantis, nothing else matters.

I am nature. I must cry, laugh, scream, dance, hug, scribble, jump, play, drink water, run, love, forgive, forgive, forgive. Surrender. I am nature. I am wild.