Aaron Perkins

Six characters in search of an author

February 22nd – March 11th, 2023

Taking its title from an early 20th century meta-theatrical absurdist play written by Luigi Pirandello, Six characters in search of an author interrogates the story we each tell ourself about our own self through a suite of text-based works. 

A life does not progress through stages of rising action, climax, and falling action towards resolution. Instead, it occurs as an undifferentiated sequence of experiences of varying importance that are only given coherence through a narrativisation of self. Exit/Exeunt You draws attention to this process, offering a set of stage directions to its viewer that emphasise their movement between the accompanying paintings. The Termini works each draw an analogy between the material processes of painting and the process of self-narrativisation. Like the story we each tell ourself about our own self, the composite forms that emerge from within the construction lines, brushwork, and incidental smudges and drips are ones that have been reinforced through repetition and continual refinement.

The process of self-narrativisation is one that is mediated by fiction and ultimately generative of another: an autofiction unique to each individual through which we interact with reality. Like Pirandello’s play, Six characters in search of an author brings this to the fore.