Simon Hollington: The Outward Urge

There’s a truly great exhibition of drawings, “The Outward Urge,” by Simon Hollington at The Smithfield Gallery but you only have until November 7 to see it. Hurry along now!

These drawings depict the first earthlings ever to venture into space. Taken from contemporary documentation, they employ the backdrop of early space exploration to observe our difficult relationship with the animals that are man’s nearest biological relatives.

The Grumpy Vegan believes there is a fine line between good and bad art which addresses society’s treatment of animals. What distinguishes them is how the humans are depicted. Good art involving animal exploitation tends to depict humans sensitively and sympathetically and caught up as unwilling players in a set of tragic circumstances. Generally, bad art tends to demonizes humans involved in the depiction of injustice toward animals thereby making them stereotypically villains. We are, of course, all villains to varying degrees throughout our lives. We are all complicit.

Hollington’s drawings sensitively depicts the chimpanzees and shows the humans present as players involved in the animals’ exploitation but not as evil characters. Anyway, what do you think? The Guardian has an excellent slide show.

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