Educational Gallery

Saints of Unknowing by Andreea Alunei

On display November 1-23, 2025

Artist Statement: “I don’t know,” she cried.“Good,” came the response. “Not knowing is the beginning of knowing.”

Saints have been imagined across the ages as flawless protectors, figures we revere but never resemble. I begin with another premise: we are all saints. Sacredness is inherent and unavoidable. It is not perfection but potential, sometimes near to the surface, other times impossibly remote.Saints of Unknowing inhabits the threshold before sanctity is recognized, the human state of not yet knowing. In these paintings, what lies within us also moves outward. Human dramas of intimacy, caregiving, sustenance, desire, conflict, love, grief, and death feel urgent up close, yet become fleeting when considered within a larger existential frame.There is also comedy in this. We take ourselves too seriously, yet life is at once profoundly grave and utterly absurd. It is in this paradox that the saints of unknowing appear.