05/28/2026
It is the last weekend to see “Phantasma,” PLATO’s current group exhibition exploring imagination, dreams and illusions in contemporary painting. The show features works by Alex Sutcliffe, Alic Brock, Darina Karpov, Henry Hung Chang, Jamie Adams, Tang Shuo, and Vickie Vainionpää. The last day to see it is this Saturday, May 30!
“Since time immemorial, great thinkers have debated the nature of imagination. According to the ancient Greek philosopher Plato, fantasy—or phantasma—represents a false appearance, an illusion that deceives the senses and occupies the lowest level of reality. Aristotle, on the other hand, believed that the image-making faculty of the soul (phantasia) makes the higher processes of thinking possible. As he wrote in De Anima, “The soul never thinks without a phantasm.”
The images that enter our minds from the outside world have changed dramatically over the centuries, expanding our internal cache of archetypal figures and individual phantasmata (the plural of phantasma). The pace and scale at which we consume images have also accelerated. Alongside the centuries-old foundations of printed matter, theater, and fine art, films, online videos, social media posts, and the endless scroll of our own camera rolls now contribute to our vast imaginative picture libraries—inevitably invading our dreams and fantasies.”
