Daniel & Clara: The Watcher and the Bird

22 Feb-15 Sep 2024

Overview

“The hardest thing of all is to see what is really there.”
– J. A. Baker, The Peregrine

This exhibition presents a new body of work by Daniel & Clara about the human gaze. By focusing on bird watching, they explore the optical and psychological processes at play when humans look at nature.

The Watcher and the Bird takes J.A. Baker’s 1967 book The Peregrine as inspiration. This seminal work of nature writing recounts the author’s observations of peregrine falcons over a single winter on the Essex coast. As Baker’s text unfolds, the limits of human vision and imagination are continuously confronted as he attempts to see beyond the precipice of the human and become the bird.

Through moving image, mail art and photography, Daniel & Clara draw into view the projections that take place between watcher and bird.

This project took inspiration from the University of Essex’s JA Baker archive, and has been made possible with funding from Arts Council England.

Biog:

Since meeting in 2010 Daniel & Clara have dedicated themselves to a shared life of creative experimentation, working across moving image, photography, performance and mail art to explore the nature of human experience, perception and reality. They currently live on Mersea Island on the Essex coast, UK.