DIANA THATER

Since Thater began working with the gallery in1992, she has produced a number of large-scaleinstallations involving light and video in the spaceat 6150 Wilshire Blvd in addition to the seminalworks first exhibited at the gallery’s originalspace at 1301 Franklin St in Santa Monica. TheConversation, debuts a new body of work,consisting of two video pieces, as well asThater’s signature window gel-installations. Theexhibition is on view through November 13,

2021.

“There are many that I know and I know it. They are many that I know and they know it. They areall of them themselves and they repeat it and I hear it. Always I listen to it.”– Gertrude Stein_, The Making of Americans_

Many of Diana Thater’s works begin with the point at which the subjectivity of humans andanimals meet. Through color, light, image, and form, the artist generates an experience withwhich the viewer can empathize without anthropomorphizing the natural world. In _Talk to Us_(2021) and Listen to Us (2021), the artist’s second major sound works, two human voices mirroreach other in call and response, beginning with simple phrases and progressing into longerones, mimicking a parrot-like voice. A third audio track of an African grey parrot vocalizing tohimself without knowing he is being observed plays simultaneously as an external-internalmonologue. The common misconception is that parrots are mimics, when in fact they processlanguage as humans do, through socialization, rather than simply repeating what is heard. Likehumans, a parrot’s subjectivity is expressed through its vocalizations, asserting its presencethrough speech and volume. With this work, Thater subverts the false notion that the use oflanguage is what separates humans from animals. As demonstrated in this cacophonousdialogue, spoken language is indeed shared between the two species. Through her use ofdramatic shifts in scale, both visual and auditory, Thater alters the viewer’s point of perceptionwithin the exhibition, creating an imme rsive installation that challenges the linear narrativeshumans rely on to make sense of themselves and the natural world.