September 2021 - January 2022

Hybrid Ground Exhibition
Sydney Children’s Hospital Foundation, Randwick

Of Other Spaces

A solo exhibition of works by Pat Younis

Hybrid Ground is an interactive exhibition concerned with the hybridised relationship between human and non-human ecologies. Exploring the poetics of viewing objects within the new technological age, the artworks exist at the intersections of alternate realities and speculative spaces. Through renders of digitally generated worlds and Augmented Reality (AR) activations, media artist Pat Younis proliferates possibilities and proposes fictional settings as a way of navigating our constantly changing environments, and act as a provocation for thinking about the future and technology’s potential role in this shifting terrain.  

There is a deep, internal connection that exists between humans and the spaces around us, whether this refers to natural spaces or otherwise. Within this thinking, no conceptualisation of a place is neutral, because we instinctively project onto these spaces our ideas, emotions, and memories, which are defining factors for how we associate with or perceive our environments. We are so interlinked with the landscape that humans often see themselves, or aspects of humanity, reflected in the spaces around them. Paradoxically, many of the works in Hybrid Ground has an innate absence of humanity, or at least humanity as we know it. Instead, Younis has depicted what could be considered pre or post humanism, or even perhaps a place void of humanity in any instance. This evokes a sense of rupture or transformation, both seemingly positive and negative, depending on the viewer. This dualistic tension is reflected throughout the series with some works engaging with a more utopian sensibility, providing a sense of refuge, where hopes for a better future are offered. Whilst some nuance dystopian qualities, where uncertainty prevails, traces of the past and present have disappeared, and the future is portrayed as an overarching, undetermined hypothesis.

Anchoring our imagination within these spaces is the atmospheric light and earthly groundcover, which act as a point of familiarity – of reason – but are ultimately disrupted by entropic happenings or things outside of rationality, exuding the idea that these spaces are something other than what or where we currently occupy. Whether it is a colossal crystal in the sky, a larger-than-life phone in the desert or a robot giving advice, a distant reality is evoked through the strangeness. Alluding to a shift towards the unconscious mind, Hybrid Ground offers us a deeper and more probing look into the artist’s imagination, as it would seems as if these metaphysical, surreal places cannot be placed by the logical mind; within tangible time or geographical location. Instead, these uncanny imaginings are other-worldly; contemporary fables imbued with societal questions surrounding the past, the present and the future, and the shifting ecological, social and global climates that inform them. These works are inherently playful however, evoking a sense of wonder through the subsequent questioning of the who, what, where, when, and why. We are living in a time of great precarity, prompting us to think about the future - both near and far - and what it might hold for us. In these hybrid and dream-like landscapes, new theologies and spiritualities are conjured, artificial intelligence and ‘otherness’ is explored, and the impacts of climate change are imagined - is this what the future holds?

Technology, much like nature, is a transformational force. They can generate and degenerate – crossing from one state into another, into another. They surround us, encompass us, and become us. So, is it possible that a symbiotic relationship will thrive between them, perhaps initialising a hybrid space where the digital and natural coexist, as prompted by Younis’ works? Currently, our present is saturated with artificiality, technological interfaces and user-based interactions. Technology has transformed our sense of reality, being and space: we download alternative realities, scroll for new stories, swipe left and right for relationships, save everything into the infamous cloud, and become reliant on the intangible beast of Wi-Fi for connectivity. Technology allows us to traverse our current space, exploring the notion that the present epoch is perhaps above all the epoch of space, an epoch of simultaneity: of juxtaposition, the near and far, the side-by-side, and the dispersed. [1] Whereby, our present merges the physical and virtual to construct hybrid and mixed realities. Technology, including the AR filters for Hybrid Ground, capitalises on this spatial hybridity, allowing you to be in the present, in another present, exuding multiple positions and temporalities simultaneously. Resemblant of the portal-like structures found in some of the works, the AR filters throughout the exhibition act as a gateway, modifying our perspectives through the camera lens to provoke speculation through immersion, and challenge our comprehension and understanding of our surroundings.

The use of AR technology aggregates new forms of cultural engagement and interactions, moving beyond the wall to provoke curiosity and activate imaginative narrative-making. Through both visual and auditory elements, the AR filters in Hybrid Ground suggest an ‘aliveness’ to the works. The hospital can be an unfamiliar environment, full of strangers, uncertainty, and without any normal routine or control, making it difficult to navigate and exist within. The AR technology aims to rouse participatory spectatorship, facilitating a form of escapism by layering digital experiences over the artworks to transform the clinical environment into a space for exploration and agency for play. 

Featured in the exhibition are three works made in collaboration with Sydney Children Hospital’s paediatric patients and their siblings. Across two-days, the artist facilitated workshops where participants responded to the theme of ‘Futuristic Worlds.’ The illustrations and ideas that emerged from these activities served as the basis for these hybrid works; which merge the collaborative efforts of the children and the artist. This collaboration was integral to the exhibition with the intent to inspire, provide a momentary reprieve and provide a distraction.

Beckoning us to look both within, without and beyond, the works in Hybrid Ground both document and offer insights into the universal capacity of the human mind to create meaning and speculation through our imagination, and the role technology can play within not only our future, but ultimately our experiences of art and the contemporary world. 

Sarah Rose
Curator