1. When Honey Tastes Like Metal
Vanessa Gravenor, Paper Swallows Rock, 2021, 4K or HD, Stereo Sound, 16 min 44 seconds
When Honey Tastes Like Metal
Mona Hatoum, Vanessa Gravenor, Patty Chang, and Tanika Williams in conversation with Natalia Nakazawa and Shasha Dothan
Curated by Jesse Bandler Firestone
AIR Gallery, March 8, 2026
A child learns to read against the backdrop of war. An infant coos. A porpoise dies. Letters are written.
When Honey Tastes Like Metal brings together a selection of video works by Mona Hatoum, Tanika Williams, Patty Chang, and Vanessa Gravenor, framed by and expanding upon Shasha Dothan’s solo exhibition at A.I.R. Gallery, P is for Pomegranates, G is for Grenade, L is for Love.
Within the exhibition, Dothan’s experience as the mother of a three-year-old grounds her ongoing consideration of violence and desensitization.
Mona Hatoum, Measures of Distance, 1988, Standard-definition video (color, sound), 15 min 26 secondsHere, the artists approach related concerns from distinct vantage points, engaging ancestry, exile, anthropomorphism, and wartime propaganda.
Tanika Williams, Genomic Memory, 2024, Digital transfer of film, 4 mins 22 secondsAcross the works, a central question emerges: what conditions shape our capacity for empathy and love—or its absence?
Patty Chang, We Are All Mothers, 2022, 4K or HD, Stereo Sound, 19 min 52 seconds