James Drake explores animal and human nature in City of Tells, an exhibition of his latest work. The exhibition will consist of two large pieces of approximately the same size (12 feet high by 32 feet long). One piece, a video projection in three parts, documents the spontaneous actions and responses elicited in different animals—a herd of hungry swine, a hummingbird, a python—when confronted with a banquet table. The other piece, a charcoal drawing on paper, mounted on canvas, depicts a social gathering of important people in the artists life with the same banquet table in the foreground. By using the motif of the table as a Renaissance tableau, Drake references biblical tales and cultural mythology. City of Tells poetically addresses a collective Western history and daily life.

The soundtrack to the video is composed by Pascal Dusapin, recipient of the Victoire de la Musique, the French Music Academy Award for the composer of the year.