Body As Narrative:
The concept is a window into the Rape of Nanking in the second world war.
I created a striped fabric of Chinese characters that tell the story of this horror and holocaust in which Japanese soldiers made a killing game. In the details: gang rape, prostitution of young girls, and pregnant women’s bellies sliced open. Sons forced to rape their mothers; fathers forced to rape their daughters. Monks who declared celibacy were also forced to rape women.
The Rape of Nanking has easily become a keystone in the construction of modern Chinese identity. Iris Chang’s novel about this massacre left an overwhelming impression on me, and I have always wanted to return a bit of humanity to this trauma.