Acquiesce consists of a herd of thirty elongated sheep, scattered throughout the gallery, each standing over two metres tall.  They occupy the gallery like fragile monuments, shrouded in silence and unease. Their stretched legs suggest instability, but also a kind of stubborn endurance.

 

The work speaks to a condition I recognise in the world around me, where the quiet comfort of belonging comes at a cost. Nietzsche described this as herd morality, characterised by the safety of the group, where differences are perceived as dangerous. In this installation, the flock becomes a metaphor for that pull towards sameness. Control has become internalised, and society consists of achievement-oriented individuals, as the contemporary philosopher Byung-Chul Han argues.

 

Some of the sheep carry cameras inside their eyes. These do not just watch everyone, but they also stream. Images flow to a monitor in the space and to social media in real time, where visibility and transparency become another form of control. This speaks to Han’s ideas on psychopolitics, where the shepherd is gone, but we have learned to watch ourselves. Surveillance has become participation.

 

This work questions what it means to live in a culture that promises freedom while quietly demanding exposure and compliance. The sheep stand silent, obedient, hollow, performing for a gaze they no longer need to fear, because it has already moved inside them.