Photo by Mark Terry 
Photo by Nancy Buchanan 
Photo by Poshiya Kakel 
Photo by Guelan Abdullah | MASS (2008) |
|
Kurdistan-Iraq October 2007 & May 2008 I met Adalet Garmiany several years ago in Hull. He was a young, visionary refugee with a fervent desire to activate exchange projects between artists in the UK and Iraq. He subsequently formed the organisation ARTROLE and I have twice visited Kurdistan-Iraq with this group and have met many artists in very varied circumstances. The performance MASS was stimulated by these interactions and by visiting sites, particularly those related to the Anfal campaign against the Kurds. In a museum, I was extremely moved to see fragments of clothes from people buried alive in the recent Kurdish genocides and, later, the graves of the unknown dead covered in cloth flowers. I proposed to revisit Bells of Shoreditch with Kurdish women and ideas were developed for MASS. I returned to Kurdistan in May 2008 to find a space and work with local women towards the piece which was performed in a disused Ba'thist prison compound. I was painfully aware that the women shared deep recent tragedy and that the performance space resonated with desperate past dread. Although, as in Bells of Shoreditch, the tranquil, uplifting and lyrical existed, now, a dark, claustrophobic sense pervaded, making the fragments of dresses truly haunting as they ascended, scarring the deep blue sky. The performance opened between us a profound, non-language based communication and one I will always value. |
|
|
|
|