First solo exhibit of QWARK

It’s become a gut instinct to be repulsed by rats. We see them as creatures of filth and infection, unwanted in our homes and establishments. Yet for Qwark, such creatures are welcomed as both guest and staff. The Great Rat Hotel narrates the story of the artist’s own personal universe where the titular hotel is home to all manner of rats, from dignified hoteliers to their self-indulgent, busy tenants. As his story transpires in vivid and careful detail, two rats come to the forefront as the protagonists: Mr. White and Stripes the Bellboy. They dutifully keep the hotel and all its residents in order. As we watch the almost cartoonish yet familiar disarray of the Great Rat Hotel unfold, the boundary between the narratives we recognize and the ones we abandon starts to blur.

Qwark has always had a special relationship with rats. Where others would neglect them, he would take them in. Persevering through his own struggles with mental health, Qwark saw a kindred spirit in the rat, as life seemed to thrust upon them both the role of the underdog. Rats are “communal, very social, intelligent, and creatures of empathy,” the artist reflects. “And they are absolutely trainable.” In opening his imagined hotel, he illustrates the ability of even the most invisible of forces to remain in control of the bustling inner workings of our daily lives.

Where one imagines luxury and convenience, Qwark portrays the hotel as a symbol of the mind. Like clockwork, its staff functions to keep its guests safe and comfortable. Similarly, the artist works to calm the everyday chaos that plagues his mind, where intrusive emotions often threaten to overwhelm. In this hotel, Mr. White (the Conscience) and Stripes (the Consciousness) work in tandem to maintain order. Rats are the details often dismissed in many environments. Not in this hotel, where they serve as the very details that bring each scene to life with a lively energy.

Welcome to The Great Rat Hotel. All creatures are welcome… but not everyone can stay.

– Text by Mara Fabella