#289 words

Mister Loew... hobbled. In front of the basin. It was a little bit on the strange side. He hobbled and fretted, staring at a distinct point of the aquarium. And then back at the mermaid. I looked at this for maybe half an hour, while checking the water composition for the 500th time, before I left my office and tapped him on the shoulder. "I'M just- ... looking," he said, blinking. I patted his shoulder a few times and looked a little bit concerned: "Are you okay?" He glanced back at the aquarium: "... I'm worried for the octopus" "Eh... I'm sorry to break it to you, but... octopi are... disposable. It was part of the menu this lunch?" Here he had the mind to look appalled for three seconds. "Yes, but... we put him in there," he said. As dignified as that sentence could possibly be spoken. "... but you actually wanted to make a terrarium, didn't you?" I said, because we wanted to actually do something else. "I wanted to see how it goes before I try," he said. "... as you can see, she mostly watched the the critter. Because it acted kind of silly. Maybe missed to terrify things. Or... she actually watched you bobbing in front of the basin, which looks entirely ridiculous," I huffed, because it was true. "The octopus is safe, at the very least," he nodded, weirdly proud, it seemed. What a strange man. But alright. "You know, if you distract her with a terrarium, it might be even safer" He tilted his head slightly, encouragement seemed to work, he did walk off for a bit. ... he seemed to not work with living beings most of the time, I supposed.

One artwork did not stand out to me immediately, but left the most lasting impact on me. Lucy Griggs’ Special Forces 2 is painted directly onto a white wall, and is a very large, yet simple, rendering of a soldier with a gun hiding in reeds in what appears to be a field. This artwork initially seemed like just yet another image of war, and fitted in seamlessly with the surrounding works that contained sometimes graphic and confronting material. When I read the painting description, however, I was shocked to discover that this artwork was actually taken from a children’s colouring book from Kazakhstan, on the Southern border of Russia. Kazakhstan is known for being the birthplace of the AK-47 machine gun. I was shocked that an image like this, that fitted in and blended with the confronting images around me, could be found in a child’s colouring book. The romantic image of childhood innocence, a familiar childhood activity of colouring in, set against the realities of war, was confronting. Griggs commented on how such images are being normalised, “allowing them to infiltrate children’s thoughts through play”. These images also encourage acceptance of conflict and violence as commonplace encounters. This artwork is both compelling and confronting; it resonated with me, especially in light of news reports of children’s involvement and exposure to such violent content.