“A Labyrinth Called Hope” [Acrylic paint,felt, wood,mild steel]. Here the artist invites the viewer to engage playfully in a game. Originally conceived as a full-scalelabyrinth the piece was scaled back to a pin ball mazewhere the participant must navigate two hand carved wooden orbs through a labyrinth that hints at “HOPE” in abstract calligraphy. Like Mark Gertler’s “Merry-Go-Round” Gada takes an innocent childhood game to turn it into an image of something bleaker. In the human labyrinth of the mind where thoughts go round and round and often hit a dead end, the last of human emotions to die is hope, as without hope all else is fades. Gada cynically builds his machine with no way out so the participant has no escape.As in Sartre’s existential play “No Exit” the installation becomes an absurdist toy where one is offered hope but delivered despair. One suspects that for Gada, like Sartre,“..hell is other people” as it is notable that Gada puts two balls into the maze, each colliding into each other and blocking each other’s way.

texy by Julian Parr