WORK > A Walk through a Labyrinth

A Walk Through a Labyrinth invokes the myth of the Minotaur to take viewers on a journey through a controlled space. Using passages, obstacles, and dead ends, the exhibition mimics the physical and psychological process of navigating a restricted society.

The pathways are created by wooden doors and metal frames, adorned with fabric and metal hooks. These rigid structures cast shadows that stretch from the floor to the walls. The shadows reflect different perspectives of the frames, creating a grid that enacts an enormous birdcage. The viewer inevitably is caught in these spatial knots of frames and fabric. The search for the correct pathway is afflicted by both the fear of imprisonment in the maze and the fear of confronting the Minotaur; an absent figure that is felt through the tension and the casted shadows.

Amid the labyrinth, the wooden frames create a doorway between the governed public space and the private space of the home. The exhibition questions how metaphors, narratives and materials inspire one to re-imagine the construction of these two domains. Informed by my personal experiences growing up in Iran, the work considers the fragmented relationship between the public and the private and how one’s subjectivity is constructed within the limitations of these distinct worlds. The dynamic passages through the exhibition create a border between the two spaces, allowing one to step into a new state and leave the other behind.