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Demonstration:
strangulation of the linguistic impulse /
performability of the resistant character
fabric and thread, 'exotic' cock skin, timer, picket
sign, transparent display, video.
Dimensions variable
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Artist's Statement
This text is to examine the language-based construction of
an emotionally to-scale model of what is not a mere
incident, but a contemporary condition. Specifically
referenced is the case of the multinational fast food
chain, McDonald's, which fired its Employee of the Month,
Abeer Zinaty, for speaking in her native tongue. The
Arabic language is repeatedly mistaken for a bomb.
We enlist the cock skin in performing a socio-sculptural
demonstration: the golden arches are carefully tied round
the bird's neck. And pulled tight. This sort of torture is
not a new phenomenon; repression and censorship are not
new aspects of a corrupt power. Further, the physical
alienation of an exotic enemy serves well to reassure a
despised self-image. But the condition might become
internalized: as the tongue, pressed against the roof of
the mouth, poises to deliver an expression perhaps of
utmost banality, a sudden self-censuring terror seizes the
speaker.
"L'anha tibga binit 'arab1," she blurts, through warm and
spittly breath (in order that she summon the muscle).
Gasps and glares, suspicion and fear for one's life (the
casual presence of an Arab or Muslim has an unfortunate
habit of reminding others of their imminent mortality)!
"...Do you want something to drink with that?"
It is demonstrated: Arabic words fly in the face of
McDonaldland decree. Through a worker's uncomplicated
aspiration for wages, and the overwhelming stranglehold of
an international corporate economy, she attains martyrdom
through simply willed words (though she who remembers her
tongue will taste the imbalance of justice even more
intensely).
Thus the words are sewn, with one continuous thread to
embroider reverence for the resistant character. |
About the Artist
Rheim Alkadhi, the daughter of an American mother and an
Iraqi father, lived in the Middle East throughout the
1970s. In a practice that includes new media as well as
manual disciplines, she conveys desires and dangers of
intercultural identity within the expanding, potentially
explosive terrain of visual and political culture. She has
shown her work at such venues as Barbara Davis Gallery in
Houston, Korean Cultural Center in Los Angeles, and
Blinding Light Cinema in Vancouver, BC. She currently
lives and works in Los Angeles. |
