The Optimist
One of my favorite tracks I listen to almost on the daily is "The Pessimist (feat. J. Cole)" on Wale's third studio album titled"The Album About Nothing". In the intro, Jerry tells George "Oh so there is still hope?", and George responds saying "I don't want hope, hope is killing me. My dream is to become hopeless. When you're hopeless, you don't care, and when you don't care, that indifference,it makes you attractive."
One of my favorite tracks I listen to almost on the daily is "The Pessimist (feat. J. Cole)" on Wale's third studio album titled"The Album About Nothing". In the intro, Jerry tells George "Oh so there is still hope?", and George responds saying "I don't want hope, hope is killing me. My dream is to become hopeless. When you're hopeless, you don't care, and when you don't care, that indifference,it makes you attractive."
I find this conversation intriguing, depending on the logic that to dream is to wish something into your existence, and to wish, is to hope (that which you wish) into existence. Thus, paradoxically all that George is saying is hoping to be hopeless. However his genuine concern for hoping to be hopeless is what fascinates me. He states that hope is killing him. How can the only factor (hope) be your very nemesis? Unless dying is what you hope for. I think when we hope for something, we want it manifest in our existential realities. It might just be a fantasy, or in dire situations, the very bed rock on which one's life is anchored. Can you afford to be hopeless in such a situation as the latter? In my 28 April years, my experience tells me that, such prolonged hope is also likely to morph into desperation. Thus, characterized by a state of hopelessness; which has as its only antidote to be hope.
Do you continue to hope even though the condition seems hopeless? Do you continue to hope at the expense of being taken advantage off? Will you rather hope to be hopeless?
The photographs under the series "Get well soon" are taken from staged installations, using all the medicine (both orthodox and traditional) collected form a very close relation, as well as re-staging of some healing rituals that had to be performed over the past 27 years.
Do you continue to hope even though the condition seems hopeless? Do you continue to hope at the expense of being taken advantage off? Will you rather hope to be hopeless?
The photographs under the series "Get well soon" are taken from staged installations, using all the medicine (both orthodox and traditional) collected form a very close relation, as well as re-staging of some healing rituals that had to be performed over the past 27 years.
This body of work is essentially about a family's hope; which has prolonged to the extent of desperation. And as the woes of desperation may have it, it's opened up the doors to exploitation. But continues to hope that one of these days, the solution will arrive.
“Olive and Green are opposing harmonies”
Digital photograph 29.55 x 49.28 in. 2015
©Kelvin Haizel
Digital photograph 29.55 x 49.28 in. 2015
©Kelvin Haizel
“...and none of the drugs and rituals affected
the red chair"
Digital photograph 29.55 x 49.28 in. 2015
©Kelvin Haizel
Digital photograph 29.55 x 49.28 in. 2015
©Kelvin Haizel
Digital photograph 29.55 x 49.28 in. 2015
©Kelvin Haizel
Digital photograph 29.55 x 49.28 in. 2015
©Kelvin Haizel
Digital photograph 29.55 x 49.28 in. 2015
©Kelvin Haizel
“A bit of everything reflected”
Digital photograph 49.28 x 29.55 in. 2015
©Kelvin Haizel
Digital photograph 49.28 x 29.55 in. 2015
©Kelvin Haizel
