At the base of the cardboard box that is Jaden Gallagher’s practice, I find there to be a compulsion similar to hoarding. It is hoarding in the sense that it is born of an accumulation of objects. As a result of this, Jaden’s work speculates the complex relationships that exist between subject and object, spectator and spectacle. Jaden’s recent box of work is delivered without packaging foam or bubble wrap. It marks the subjugation of the body on the part of the technological object and reflects a distorted perception of reality. This all points to the fact that, as subjects, we are no longer needed to operate the world of objects, the hamster wheel continues to turn on its own accord; and despite our attempts to control the world around us, we are perhaps all hoarders lost inside a swelling environment of objects that alienates us from our own existence.
by Callum Galletly
