Carlos Museum’s ‘Compassion’ explores and encourages caring for one another

Here are key elements museum guests will encounter:

Credit: Photo by Isadora Pennington

Credit: Photo by Isadora Pennington

Portraits of a remote father

Immediately upon entering the gallery, oversized portraits from Shingo Kanagawa’s “father” series captured my attention. While technically correct and aesthetically pleasing in composition, it’s the haunting nature of the untold story within these photographs that ekes in from the edges and overtakes the experience.

The artist’s often-absent father appears in a series of portraits in which he is pictured both intimately and at an arm’s length. On the artist’s website, he writes that his father disappeared from his life for some months, and when he returned he seemed careless in regard to anything or anyone, including himself. To try to connect with his father in this new dynamic is painful and confusing to the artist, made visual through photography. 

Credit: Photo by Mike Jensen

Credit: Photo by Mike Jensen

When hearts beat as one

Where the Kanagawa exhibit confronts, the adjacent “Inochi Theater: If Your Life Were Light” exhibit whispers. Around a curved, dark wall is a doorway covered by a black curtain. Inside in the pitch dark, a biometric-infused art installation awaits.

I was instructed to place my hands on sensors on the table in front of me that would measure my heartbeat. Around the room, as others sat and also placed their hands on the sensors, beams of light burst from our fingertips in time with our heartbeats and traveled from our hands up into the canopy of a twisting tree above us. 

Designed by Kosuke Matsushima, Masashi Fujimoto, Ryoji Yukino and Sui Nacazima of the Japanese art collective ARu, Inc, the installation seeks to bridge the gap between who we think we are as individuals and the way that our energy can be in community with one another.

Matsushima was putting the finishing touches on the work when I visited the exhibit. He explained that he had grown interested in the way that different animals have different heartbeat frequencies and how, in contrast to clocks and commonly accepted timekeeping, one might have a different experience with the world and with time based on one’s heartbeat. Indeed, there is a negative correlation between the frequency of an animal’s heartbeat and its lifespan — the more heartbeats per minute, the shorter the lifespan. This fascinated Matsushima and led him to explore what other ways we could visualize not just our own personal heartbeat as a means of timekeeping but also how we could see and interact with those of the people around us. 

The result is both a welcome respite from the real world — soft drapes muffle sound; the enveloping darkness is like an embrace — and also a reminder of our relationships with those around us. In the dark, I didn’t know anything about the other humans in the room and couldn’t make any assumptions about who they were based on visual cues. The exhibit seems to ask for a meditative silence, and, as hands graced the tops of these sensors, one was quickly reminded of the simple humanity of the people near us. 

‘The Water Station’ conveys connection

Deeper into the gallery, there are side rooms with smaller exhibits, including a taped segment of “The Water Station,” a wordless play written by Japanese playwright Shogo Ota and directed by  Emory Theater Studies Professor Héctor Álvarez. In the performance, black represents silence or absence, and a stream of water from a broken pipe slowly drips into every scene. “The Water Station” explores themes of fragility, conflict, love and the relationship between one another. 

Credit: Photo by Isadora Pennington

Credit: Photo by Isadora Pennington

From ‘The Troubles’ to a life of kindness

An adjacent gallery features images from the life of Richard Moore, who, as a 10-year-old in 1972, was blinded by a rubber bullet shot by a British soldier during the Northern Ireland “Troubles.” Instead of becoming bitter, Moore channeled his energy into a life of kindness and charity, later running the Children in Crossfire organization, addressing injustice among poor children in Tanzania, Ethiopia and Ireland.

Moore, who will give a free talk at the museum on Sunday, later made amends with the soldier who shot him, a moving example of compassion in action.

Credit: Photo by Isadora Pennington

Credit: Photo by Isadora Pennington

Photographs, ‘Youth Voices’ speak of humanity

Another area of the gallery displays photographs from the Carlos’ permanent collection by Danny Lyon, Manjari Sharma, Kristin Capp and José Ibarra Rizo, among others. These “Shared World” pieces explore themes of connectivity, memory and identity.

“In shaping ‘Shared Worlds,’ (‘Compassion’s’ facilitating curator and the Carlos’ curator of works on paper) Andi McKenzie and I asked: How can empathy become visible? How can art surface both individuality and interdependence?” said Jennifer Knox, a member of the “Compassion” curatorial team who is Woodward Academy’s director of character education and Ron M. Brill chair of ethical leadership.

Knox also coordinated “Youth Voices,” a large installation of K-12 students’ responses as part of Emory’s SEE Learning (Social, Emotional, and Ethical Learning) affiliate, which embeds compassion into curriculum.

“By pairing diverse visual languages, slowing perception and creating opportunities for dialogue, we invite viewers to experience empathy not as sentimentality but as a skillful, relational practice that illuminates shared humanity,” Knox said.

“The student contributions in ‘Youth Voices’ highlight what young people from 13 countries value most, allowing visitors to witness compassion as it emerges in developmental stages,” she said.

Emory’s long study of compassion

“Many don’t know it, but Emory is a major international center for the study of compassion,” said exhibition curator Brendan Ozawa-de Silva, associate teaching professor in the Center for Contemplative Science and Compassion-Based Ethics at Emory University and global professor at Tokyo’s Keio University. “This work has been going on in various ways for the past three decades across multiple schools and departments from primatology to ethics to health care to politics. Through their research, work and life, Emory faculty members have changed the way we look at morality, emotions and who we are as human beings.”

Inspired by the Dalai Lama, Emory’s pioneering Compassion Center, officially known as the Center for Contemplative Science and Compassion-Based Ethics, opened in 2017.

Carlos Museum Director Henry Kim maintains a vision to better integrate the museum with the university in terms of academics and research, and so the idea of compassion through art seemed worth exploring. 

“Compassion is essential to our survival as a human species. If we neglect compassion, what will happen to us? Things will break down and our future — and that of our planet — will be bleak,” Ozawa-de Silva said.

Ozawa-de Silva explained that compassion is essential to our health and to our humanity. It’s how we relate to one another and how we move forward together into a better and brighter future.

“Just like our hearts, which are hidden inside our bodies, compassion is something we can miss if we don’t make it visible,” Ozawa-de Silva continued, pointing out this exhibit’s interactive elements, such as the stones that visitors pick up at the entrance and are encouraged to leave by the aspects that move them most. “This represents a shift away from the invisibility of the audience in a museum setting — you can see that people came before you, that they engaged with the art and that they have been moved by it.” 

Credit: Photo by Isadora Pennington

Credit: Photo by Isadora Pennington

Helping people feel seen

Knox said the exhibition feels “especially important at a time when many young people and adults are experiencing increasing levels of anxiety, depression and loneliness. Despite constant connection, many people feel unseen in their inner lives. One of the exhibition’s central intentions is to create a space where the viewer’s inner experience matters.”

“Compassion: What Moves You?” organizers hope that museum visitors are inspired to consider how we relate to one another and how to share our personal stories, whether it be through pain, pleasure or the very beating of our own hearts. 

“Art brings things out into the world and asks: What do you think? What do you feel?” Ozawa-de Silva said. “Then we can have a dialogue, and we can learn from each other.”

IF YOU GO

“Compassion: What Moves You?”

Through Oct. 25. $10 adults, $8 seniors and ages 6-17. 10 a.m.–5 p.m. Tuesdays-Saturdays, noon-5 p.m. Sundays. Michael C. Carlos Museum, 571 S. Kilgo Circle, Atlanta. carlos.emory.edu.

Richard Moore speaks on compassion and forgiveness at 3 p.m. Sunday. Free with registration required. Carlos Museum’s Ackerman Hall, 571 S. Kilgo Circle, Atlanta. carlos.emory.edu.

Credit: ArtsATL

Credit: ArtsATL

MEET OUR PARTNER