Stockholm Syndrome, 2010, 160 painted razors, 43 x 22 mm each
Stockholm Syndrome has three components, the first part of which is made of 160 razor blades, on which the flags of countries from all over the world are depicted in a format similar to the gallery of flags in a typical school atlas. The razor blades are painted using nail polish and hanged on the wall using very thin pins. The second component is about the planning stage of the installation where the scheme was drawn on paper detailing the thoughts and plans of how to paint the flag designs on razors before the actual production. This drawing on a craft sketch paper is also hanged on the wall. The third component is a desktop with the nail polish stains left over from the actual painting process. All of the three components of the work are positioned in a time-line along the installation's lifespan. As a result, the processes of the work such as planning or messing the studio during creation became the work itself.
The importance I give to the handwork could be connected to the destruction of hierarchy between the crafts and arts in Feminist art movements.
"Should not feminists favor the decorative and utilitarian crafts -- sewing, quilting, weaving, appliqué, china painting -- because they constituted most of the creative production of women. But the decorative and useful had long been denigrated in the art world. Elitists maintained that if "art" was useful, it could not be free, and if it was decorative, it could not be serious. To rehabilitate the artistic heritage of women, feminists challenged the hierarchical distinction between the "low" crafts and "high" painting and sculpture, introducing the materials and techniques of the one into the other. They also challenged the proscription of the decorative and the functional."
Usage of female oriented nail polish and male oriented razors implies a subtle gender based contrast between materials which is not a major subject emphasized in the piece but an accent in harmony with the feminist subtext.
Using razor blades, as expected, was a constant source of mild pain and injury while producing this work. The act of using razors as an art material resulted in a situation where both the material and the painful art making process nearly imprisoned the artist. The situation resembled a hostage condition that involved simultaneous sympathy and displeasure. Stockholm Syndrome is made of vivid-colored, tiny flags; that almost looks 'cute' and childish in dramatic contrast to the material’s sharp and dangerous nature. This inner paradox of the work also refers to many morbid hostage situations in our world where we observe numerous nationalisms taking nations hostage.
When the work Stockholm Syndrome was first exhibited in Gallery Nev in the exhibition entitled Nevnesil, Art of Defence (April 29-May 28 2011), I observed that the audience was not reluctant to touch the razors, pushing them along the pins they are hanged on. Did the hand-made quality, which might have sent a subliminal message that these pieces were touched before, encouraged the people to touch them, or did the hostage-captor relationship between the nations and the people, also formed between the audience and the piece?
