On exhibit May 22- June 22, 2003
Day of Dialogue: June 22, 4:00- 5:30 p.m.
Gallery Subversive
Cherry Building, 320 11th Ave. SE, Suite B23
Cedar Rapids, Iowa.
ph. 319. 431.4858
… Those who profess to favor freedom and yet depreciate agitation want crops without plowing the ground.
– Fredrick Douglass
Shedding is a metaphor for loss. In reality, wars have no winners. Victories declared only point to the cowardice of the perpetrators of government-sanctioned violence who deliberately omit the news of children, women and men suffering their criminal actions.
As the empty rhetoric of “patriotism” drowns out dissenting voices, and while our fundamental rights to freedom of speech and assembly are branded “un-American”, I make art that is about what undermines our ability to coexist conscientiously and in peace.
Shedding is my experience as an Iranian who witnessed the pains of a country oppressed by the Shah's US-backed dictatorship, who endured the long years of Iran-Iraq war when US-made missiles launched from Iraq — then an American “friend” — delivered explosions that killed and maimed our loved ones daily, who has lived in exile to get away from the brutality of the present fundamentalist regime in Iran that capitalizes on the popular opposition to the interventionist practices of the US and the West to justify its
brutality.
Shedding is my voice as a woman who believes that all life is sacred and that the patriarchal world domination has always failed us and must be replaced. Shedding is my plight as a citizen of the USA, remembering that this colorful world of immigrants was constructed through sinful violence against the native inhabitants of the land and through a history of slavery and exploitation.
To live, we must allow the idealism of “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for all” bloom, and accept nurturing and cooperation as the principles of our national and global survival.
Shedding is not a response to the recent war on Iraq alone. It is a tribute to the people of Japan, China, Korea, Guatemala, Indonesia, Cuba, Congo, Peru, Laos, Vietnam, Cambodia, East Timor, Chile, Grenada, Libya, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Panama, Sudan, Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Palestine and all the other places where blood has been shed under the cloak of liberty, security and national interest.
May love, peace and kindness be our guiding light >>>
In acknowledgment that our government owes the victims of its wars reparation, please .
