In The Gates of Apophenia, Candida Powell-Williams creates a singular architectural installation by surrounding the viewer with her miniature sculptural Major Arcana (trump cards). Each card is explored through varying arrangements of repeated sculptural forms creating compositions such as empty castles, temple-like structures, boats and lighthouses, accompanied by animal heads and frozen magician’s gloves as well as fairytale paraphernalia and familiar or mysterious symbols. The sculptures are made from a range of materials, including ceramic, jesmonite, cardboard, textiles and resin with roughly shaped surfaces in saturated pigments of pinks, purples, yellows and greens and ghostly whites. The work here is stripped of the tarots original universal human imagery to draw attention to how object and architecture alone might convey spiritual meaning or imply narrative and plays with the interpretation of symbols. Instigated by philosophical questions about humankind’s disharmony with the universe, these works are choreographed to focus on the potential of esoteric modes of thinking to transform perception.

Powell-Williams’ sculptural and performance works are a response to researching the slippage that occurs between primary and secondary source material, exploring the consequences of retelling history and how we construct memory through objects. Her research is guided by philosophical questions about our attempts to navigate within the purposeless and chaotic universe through the connection of the mundane materiality of objects to action and belief.