A collaboration between 
Cultur·Able, Chronically Online Gallery, and The Layered Onion

Belonging

Dear friends,

We are excited to present ‘Belonging‘, a showing of 20 unique perspectives on what it means to belong. Our three organizations, Chronically Online Gallery, The Layered Onion, and Cultur·Able, came together to engage our audiences, and the larger creative disabled community to participate in a gallery showcase of their works. With our like-minded approach, we brainstormed on what prompts would best bring about shared experiences, while allowing for each artist’s unique creativity to shine through. We settled on the theme of belonging, with a question of who decides who belongs. What were the intangible elements that define belonging to various and certain ‘groups‘, ‘cliques‘ or even communities? This theme impacts all of us.

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We received nearly 300 individual responses to our prompt, from disabled and ill artists from all over the world. We were pleasantly surprised to see that a vast majority of the submissions had very personal and intimate storylines. This perhaps speaks to the isolating nature of existence as a disabled, mad, or chronically ill individual within the current medical-industrial complex. We believe that it speaks to how powerfully community, belonging, or lack thereof, can impact our relationship with ourselves. 

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When putting together the show, we came to realize the importance of virtual space in the post-COVID world, where artists and organisers can continue to host spaces for individuals who may not be able to travel far distances or to interact with crowds in a comfortable environment. For us, the goal behind the showing is to build a space that supports our communities and their myriad of talents. 

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It was also important for us to go beyond merely showing the works of the artists, it was also important for us to tangibly support their creative talents. To this end, we worked with the showing artists to present a series of limited edition prints of their works, which will be on sale only for the duration of the show. The prices of the works were set after consulting the artists, only adding a minimal percentage to compensate for the various costs that go into putting together this project. We will continue to strive to offer participating artists more of the support they deserve.

We hope that all are able to enjoy the show, support the artists, and remain connected together, to ‘belong‘ together.

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Thank you,

Cultur·Able, Chronically Online Gallery, The Layered Onion