About the work

The gnome was left by a girl who ran off to join the procession. She meant to come back for it, after one last spin on the Saucers, but the music pulled her away. She held it out to her friend, who shook her head, burdened already with bags of candy floss. It was supposed to be a joke, a tiny beacon of domesticity in the chaos, but now it just sits, a silent witness. The trailer trundles by, the sound of the fair recedes, and the gnome, for all its cheerful paint, remains stranded.