{"id":31,"date":"2015-12-05T16:31:18","date_gmt":"2015-12-05T16:31:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.law.harvard.edu\/dmuhleisen\/?p=31"},"modified":"2015-12-05T16:37:23","modified_gmt":"2015-12-05T16:37:23","slug":"art-response-8","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/dmuhleisen\/2015\/12\/05\/art-response-8\/","title":{"rendered":"Charcoal Forms"},"content":{"rendered":"

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I created these tiles with charcoal in response to my reading of Persepolis. As I was reading the book, I found myself connecting with the narrator on many intrinsic levels. Though I did not understand the extent of her situation, her vitality stuck out to me. She had this intense will, even wanting to be a prophet at some point, and I think that there is something very beautiful in this will. Furthermore, she lived during a period when wearing the hijab became mandatory, where even the most modern and radical women dared only show a few strands of hair. I think that the role of the narrator was detrimental; without her age and the youthful turbulence that took place during the times of revolution and islamization, the story would have carried a completely different message. For me, because I had so many connections with her, I wanted to create a piece that revealed the true similarities that we all share.
\nWith charcoal and some brown slates, I begin to draw the progression of a person: beginning the first tile with the shoulder line and ending the last tile with a full burka. The keys were the constant black lining as well as the lack of facial distinctions. I think that regardless of what one wears on their head, if they choose to wear anything at all, there is so much more to a human being than the physical features. In removing their eyes and noses and mouths, one may say that I was restricting them of their identities. But instead, I believe that focusing so much on physical beauty and hair and the sexualization of the body is what removes identity. I believe that what matters is voice. And I could not draw voice. And a burka should not cover voice. And if a girl wants to be a prophet, who should stop her? No one. If a girl wants to show her full head of hair, or if a girl wants to keep her burka on, I don\u2019t think it is anybody else decision. I don\u2019t think anybody else has control of the body, and to try to assume this control is a betrayal of voices. I chose to leave ambiguity in the face to create discomfort. I don\u2019t think we should ever allow ourselves to be comfortable, either as Westerners or non-Westerners, and assume that anything is the way it should be. We cannot say that somebody is not allowed to wear what they wish to wear; nor is anyone else allowed to force the body into hiding. There are many ways of hiding, but I don\u2019t think that the physical manifestations of the hidden are the ones we should be paying attention to. Instead: how do we hide voices? <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I created these tiles with charcoal in response to my reading of Persepolis. As I was reading the book, I found myself connecting with the narrator on many intrinsic levels. Though I did not understand the extent of her situation, her vitality stuck out to me. She had this intense will, even wanting to be […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7877,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-31","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/dmuhleisen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/dmuhleisen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/dmuhleisen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/dmuhleisen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7877"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/dmuhleisen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/dmuhleisen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":45,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/dmuhleisen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31\/revisions\/45"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/dmuhleisen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/dmuhleisen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/archive.blogs.harvard.edu\/dmuhleisen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}