Friends, Family, Neighbors

An automated shadow puppet machine installed in the front window of the gallery, for which the exhibition is named, utilizes 160 color slide portraits taken of over 50 people from the artist’s daily life. Portraits of loved ones, roommates, co-workers and neighbors are projected on the window as a flock of shadow birds and the silhouette of a Predator drone move across their faces. For the video loop 'This is where we live', Wallace has constructed a classic A-frame house out of drone footage found on the internet. Most of the videos are of successful targeted strikes on supposed insurgents or terrorists--attacks which often also kill civilians. In contrast to the portraits of the artist’s friends, family and neighbors in the window installation, the people captured in the drone footage lack recognizable characteristics and remain anonymous. A short video, 'Predator', depicts a boy flying a model drone through private and public spaces around the East Bay. Predator reflects on our shared complicity in the use of drones as well as our simultaneous vulnerability in a world where they have become ubiquitous.