Danielle Brathwaite-Shirley
Get Home Safe
Savannah College of Art and Design Museum of Art, Savannah, GA.
September 7th 2023 - January 7th, 2024
This review felt more appropriate as a document of my felt emotions rather than from an academic or museum based viewpoint. It was a powerful exhibition executed masterfully to the point that empathy was reached from one human to another. This is the essence of true art in the eyes of Leo Tolstoy.
As I took my first step inside Get Home Safe, my breath stopped. My chest was heavy and the air I took in was short, slow and needy. The inky darkness swallowed me the further I walked into the gallery. The technical noises sounded far away, as if but a whisper in my ear. I felt isolated and alone, but rationally I knew I was not.
Walking through the plastic strips made it feel like a biohazard zone or stepping into a meat locker. Will I be exposed, like a lump of flesh controlled by bones and connective tissue? There were others in the gallery, I just could not see them nor even notice their presence.
At the end of the black room was a video game. A single, desolate podium illuminated by a red light, bringing an eery and uncomfortable feeling as you stand at the controls of this game. The music comes at you from all sides, loud enough that you cannot hear or see any others coming in behind you. In the game you cannot look behind your back for more than 3 seconds or you die. This makes it so that physically you cannot look at others coming into the gallery.
Perhaps you will die as well if you take your eyes off the screen, just like in the game. The game was simple. Get home safely. Is that really a game however? As a woman, it never is. As a trans black woman, I cannot even fathom. I was so involved in the video game so intently, and the fear that was gripping me completely curbed my movements. I found myself hoping that nothing came from the shadows at me as I was vulnerable, playing a game.
As I exited the gallery, after finishing and losing the game, I felt exhausted. Not fully aware that I held my breath the entire time, I left haunted. No, that was not a game. That was real life.
Further reading:
SCAD MOA description HERE
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