Tucked away coyly amidst a group exhibition, Jungle Space provides an elixir to the mundane urbanity of public transportation. This effort by Mr. Matthew Grabelsky is well on target for the aim of good art, which can be said to take the perfunctory and reveal its inner transcendence. The attempt at such decoding is always where the rub lies, however, we have a good demonstration of its success with the mythologizing of everyday transit.

Mr. Grabelsky intentionally synthesizes animal forms in recollection of mythological lore where animal spirits are abundantly found. Its artfulness is in the cheekiness of the entire series; whereas such a thirst for redeeming ancient cosmological harmonies of mankind with its nature and by extension natural environment may have manifested a more somber exercise. Instead, Mr. Grabelsky has chosen levity, wiping away any impressions of unsanitary conditions and tumultuous train rides towards appreciating the sacredness in minutiae.

Is it obtuse to consider so deeply the implications of playing with furry animals anthropomorphically? This, however, is the very exercise of sacredness and spirituality. It is the exhilarating imaginativeness permitted by human conduct which is outside of the temporality of the “daily grind”. Bear Necessities, for example, demonstrates superbly the use of a sacred animal cheekily amalgamated with the profanity to rush a meal which ought to be leisurely savored instead of mowed down. Perhaps, then, Mr. Grabelsky is critiquing our absence of spirituality and that our world has become purely about the hustle while forgetting to stop and smell the roses? Maybe it is more important to have time for a nice meal with loved ones than scurrying in a series of ephemera?