Opening Reception: Friday, May 6, 6-9pm @ 643 Project Space
Aaron Dadacay | Anamnesis
643 Project Space
643 N. Ventura Ave
Ventura
DATES: May 6 – 27, 2022
OPENING RECEPTION: Friday, May 6, 2021, 6-pm
643 Project Space is pleased to announce an exhibition of work by artist Aaron Dadacay, Anamnesis. Either a gift or a burden to the human memory, anamnesis, is a recollection or remembrance of things from a supposed previous existence. Often a used term in Catholicism, it is an event during a eucharistic service when the passion, resurrection, and Ascension of Christ are recalled. In this exhibition, Aaron attempts to merge the present times with his recurring episodic childhood memories, and materializes them into a body of work that culminates in a fundamental narrative reconstruction of his past.
In recollection of his certain past during the process of making his body of work, he states that, “before I left for the United States, I took whatever I could in my head…the memories of our ancestral house, people that lived there, and also the objects that were meaningful to me. Even though I’ve forgotten most of them, once in a while, random events trigger vivid memories that somehow teleport me back in time or places that I know no longer exist. It has been a while since I’ve been back (to Manila). I know our house was demolished years ago and I’ve always wanted to keep a piece from it, perhaps a door, or a window jalousie for our future home, so I can have a portal to take me back once in a while, but it was too late. Sometimes I wonder what it is now. Everyone there is probably either dead or has moved on, but don’t know where and how. Sometimes I try to unpack those memories and take inventory of what I can remember, then I wonder. It’s a vicious cycle.” Also, as an influential component for his work, Aaron refers to Ridvan Askin’s analysis of Paul Ricoeur’s "Theory of Memory'' about forgetting as a part of memory. According to Askin, “…forgetting provides what the work of remembering tries to recover. Echoing Nietzsche, Ricœur thus distinguishes between forgetting as destructive and forgetting as creative. In a similar move, forgetting becomes constitutive for the search of anamnesis. It is exactly the loss of memory which propels the search and calls for the work of remembering.”
Aaron Dadacay was born and raised in the bureaucratic capital of the Philippines during a discourse of one martial law regime, a successful presidential impeachment, and two People’s Power revolutions. He practiced studio art for four years and received an associate degree at Oxnard College. In fall of 2008, he was accepted in the UCLA arts program and received a degree in art. He has an interest in the sculptural aspect of the human psyche that’s been developed from cultural affiliations and personal mythologies. As a multidisciplinary artist, the term ‘work’ in relation to his artistic practice pertains to cultural arrangement that forms a person’s identity.
To schedule an appointment to see Aaron’s exhibition, contact him via email:
aaron.dadacay@gmail.com