Darkness into light

Darkness into light

Janneth Gil

PG Gallery 192
192 Bealey Avenue, Christchurch

23 Feb – 19 March 2021

Showing with paintings by Viv Kepes as a combined exhibition titled TRIBUTE

Janneth Gil, Widow in prayer.
Dr. Hamimah Tuyan, who now lives in Singapore, headed straight to Al- Noor (Masjid An-Nur) mosque after her 12-hour-flight. She was there in time for Friday prayers. Al Noor Mosque, Christchurch, New Zealand.

Janneth Gil and Viv Kepes were both profoundly moved by the shocking attack on Christchurch’s Muslim community on 15 March 2019. As artists they were conscious of both the historical role of the visual arts as an act of witnessing and remembering of historical events, and reparative power of art for a traumatised society.

Many in Christchurch’s Muslim community already came from highly stressful situations as refugees or immigrants navigating an unfamiliar society. It is a diverse community from many parts of the word, many cultures, bound together by religion, and even then, from different sects. Suddenly a relatively private community that had previously been overlooked or subjected to paranoid hostility, was placed on a very public platform foremost in the public consciousness. In some cases the more conservative families had lost the husband or father, their main point of contact with the city.

Read the full essay by Andrew Paul Wood on the PG Gallery website here