Sectarian Asylum

This work was created in response to poetic texts written by Habibah Sheikh, a nomadic performance artist originally from Lebanon, and the curator of the Mitli Mitlak exhibition. In the text, a character named Ruba experiences the destruction of war first hand and becomes a refugee in the process. The use of imagery and of violence evokes the emotional and physical vulnerability of certain Mediterranean themes...such as being without asylum.

This painting visions the destruction of war with the destroyed city in burned and brown tones, where the blue sky is brighter than anything on the ground. Desolate spirits and 'out of life' souls are extending from the open hands of Mary, as others fly above her, and other 'out of life' beings, half-animal, are at her side. The intensities of pain and the electrical charges from the nervous system are connected to visions in the third eye. A refugee with colonized traits resembling a spirit from the 1800’s, is with people in his heart that give him happiness, even in the predicament of losing all. In his hands, a dead child. It seems this character is very confused...very far from himself. He seems to have worked so hard to create a Western appearance, and he seems to deny that his goals are destroyed and unattainable. He does not know himself, only the mediatized personality which he has created as a defense mechanism. He is posing for the camera with the dead child in hand. All accepting Mary enshrines him. The weeping creatures out of her hands are swollen flowers who are burnt out and exhausted. To view this Westernized refugee, makes one feel that it is only the beginning of a very vast journey that will entail much more turmoil...And will strip away his Western wing and dull his wide-eyed grin into a smile of sadness.