On we go

Jim Hodges often transforms found materials and everyday objects into works that explore universal ideas of love, death, nature, time and fragility. His practice has long combined art and activism, with his 1990s works remembered for their association with the international advocacy group AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power (ACT UP).

'On we go' is a poetic response to Hodges’ personal experiences of the HIV/AIDS epidemic during the 1980s and 1990s and its impact on his friends and community. The work’s delicate chains form a diaphanous spiderweb that hangs unassumingly in a corner. Without an inhabitant, the web becomes a symbol of age and decay. However, it remains a structure that can entrap unassuming victims – whether prey or not. Hodges evokes the non-discriminatory nature of the AIDS virus, yet by replacing fragile spider silk with more durable metal, meets it with a subtle gesture of resistance.