Dearest Women: Royal College of Art - London
Past exhibition
Overview
"A series by Manal AlDowayan
Fear distorts the feeling of time. The fear of pain or death creates a need to address the finite by searching for delay, pause or transcendence into the infinite. My art practice is the medium of my temporality. My subjects are the markers of my fluctuating fears.
Fear distorts the feeling of time. The fear of pain or death creates a need to address the finite by searching for delay, pause or transcendence into the infinite. My art practice is the medium of my temporality. My subjects are the markers of my fluctuating fears.
By sewing and stitching fabric into sculptural forms and stuffing them with soft cotton, I was experiencing the comfort of their softness and at times lightweightness. The fabric forms are erect but also delicate and susceptible to collapse at any moment, with no damage or consequences. There is a constant need to move flaps, adjust objects, shift locations and align surrounding objects to make sense of their meaning. The medium distracts from the message, intentionally.
Dearest women is an attempt at creating a permanent memorial of a fragmented moment. It is not an attempt to critique or analyze history, but more of a totem of healing to help resolve the past in order to engage with the present, and time in general.
I look at the symbols used on the covers of books written by the religious men to address women and their bodies. I attempt to reform the symbols into new representations so that the invisible becomes visible.
This installation investigate a space that stands between fear and activism using fabric and soft sculptures as a symbol of resilience and fragility, of both the context and the artist."
Dearest women is an attempt at creating a permanent memorial of a fragmented moment. It is not an attempt to critique or analyze history, but more of a totem of healing to help resolve the past in order to engage with the present, and time in general.
I look at the symbols used on the covers of books written by the religious men to address women and their bodies. I attempt to reform the symbols into new representations so that the invisible becomes visible.
This installation investigate a space that stands between fear and activism using fabric and soft sculptures as a symbol of resilience and fragility, of both the context and the artist."