“Can you feel it; the sticky malaise in the air? The world is going nowhere promising, fast. Is it possible to turn things around…by tearing everything apart?

How to dismantle the world (and still feel good about yourself in the morning)
invites artists to offer contradictions to an age of crisis. The exhibition explores alternatives to dominant capitalist systems and ideologies, without reproducing the same oppressive visual and rhetorical strategies associated with political strongmen, industrial despots, and media influencers. Presenting audiences with ideas about how one might unfasten and disassemble social, political, and environmental structures, this exhibition suggests how one might envision a different world, even though we may not yet know its form.

How to dismantle the world... features artists Cybele Cox, Madi Feist, Barrie Goddard, Isabella Hone-Saunders, Emma Pham, and Nick Santoro. Each artist considered the challenge above in distinct ways, employing a range of approaches, including but not limited to recruiting avatars, next-generation communities, and celestial and earthly beings that are ambiguous in form and identity. The result is a collective of multidisciplinary works that are whimsical, humorous, and earnest, spanning mediums including painting, sculpture, site-specific installation and digital platforms.”
 
“Madi Feist’s The Snail (2026) demonstrates a post-apocalyptic lifestyle grounded in self-reliance and scant resources. Countering Santoro’s depiction of overconsumption, the work is an off-grid mobile home composed of a tricycle and trailers, inhabited by an anonymous figure who could be either a snail or a snail enthusiast. 

The assemblage resists homogeneity, combining peculiarity with practicality. Rising from the rear of the rider’s seat is a substantial wooden structure held together with recycled bamboo beams, rope, and sticky tape. The interior of the home has a table, stool, and shelves stocked with random domestic objects. With good nature, Feist suggests that it is possible to live frugally while still meeting a desire for creature comforts.

Although nomadic and solitary, the inhabitant of the snail seeks re-connection and personal growth, hinted at by the presence of self-help books. The desire for companionship and the construction of an organised dwelling suggests that dismantling dominant structures may occur through a reconsideration of intelligence systems of the more-than-human.”

Words by Tesha Malott


Madi Feist
The Snail, 2026
INDI Rambler tricycle, found furniture and household objects, wood, metal hardware, bamboo, rachet straps, plants, pvc pipe, rope, assorted textiles, castor wheels, plastic, paper, lamps, metal, shells 
Dimensions variable