Pegs

No human, if any, has ever perfectly fit into every role assigned to them without some point of disconnect or friction. No person to walk this earth has faultlessly adhered to a mindset or image of their culture without any resistance or distinction. A pervasive cliché, used to soothe those who find themselves on the outside, is the simple expression “unique.” However, surely no person amongst us is ever “un-unique” and thus the sentiment of uniqueness becomes marred by its sheer ubiquity. Despite knowing this, humankind is still keen to assign labels to individuals; these labels, while at first harmless, serve to attach coded language to the characteristics of an individual. With these “harmless” assumptions come generalizations, and behind the screen of generalization, people are lost to misconception and ambiguity.

Pegs reminds us that none among us can ever seamlessly match the shapes and figures cast by society. As the partial figures in the work reach out and contort themselves to adhere to the limitedly shaped window of society's understanding; only a minor glimpse of the person trapped behind the round and square holes comes through. The role of victim in the work is not exclusive to the depicted subjects either, but also to the viewer who, perhaps unbeknownst to them, carry the shackles of their own misunderstandings.

The feelings of isolation and of misunderstanding are not for one to suffer alone. Just as no person has ever been mold-perfect, no person has ever felt perfectly satisfied with their societal trappings. Whether the viewer may be struggling with others’ perception of them or they themselves are undergoing a crisis of identity solace, can be found in the understanding that they are not the first to feel as they do, and more than likely they will not be the last.

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