The idea of home can be easily thought of as a simple doodle a young child can make; a few straight lines and you can draw a house (roof, walls, front door, chimney with smoke coming out of it, and perhaps the complementary tree nearby). This is an image of comfort. Of security, even of belonging. But homes can be interpreted as many things, especially within the emotional and political context. If we say the word 'home', what comes to your mind? A house, or perhaps a memory, the idea of family, a smell or even a pet? But what constitutes a home? Is it a nationality? Is it a womb? Can the idea of home be something larger? Can we see a community as home? A biome? A planet? And what about our own bodies? Can we be homes to other things? After all, are we not homes to trillions of microorganisms most of which we need to survive?

Does this make you feel less of an individual? Good!

In this new exhibit, we are very fortunate to have an art installation help us ponder on these and many other questions relating to the theme of home. This interactive installation "Inflatable Environment" is the work of Natali Tubenchlak, and Hugo Richard. What does it represent? And what does it have to do with the idea of home? By encompassing the entire exhibition, it leads us to think of how homes, in all its forms of meaning, convey the idea of being protected...or, as our high school student Yining Chen mentioned in an interview for the MuseOn, homes are "shelter from the void". Welcome home!