EXTRAVAGANT BODIES: Crime and punishment

Departing from the belief that any person, regardless of his/her gender, ethnic, religious or other social affiliation, can opt for a radical act in public, in the video installation Handicraft the process preceding this decision is analyzed through the simulation of its infinite deferral. The constant repetition of creation and destruction of the object, which summarizes the historical, social and media constructed perception of terrorism, indicates the impact of the symbolic on the individual. The process of patient knitting and persistent tearing of the mask is, therefore, nothing but a constant interweaving of acceptance and rejection of both, roles and beliefs that are socially and politically imposed on the individual when dealing with the decision to radically act in public. Playing with the expectations and meanings associated with the figure of a well-known terrorist with the balaclava over the face, the Handicraft video installation transfers the uncertainty and doubt in relation to the decision process to the observer as well. Just as the young woman in the video is unable to finish her work,, so the spectator can’t entirely justify the semantics behind the image represented to him/her.

Excerpt from the text “Behind the Iconography of Terrorism and Violence in Video Works by Saša Tkačenko” by Ana Bogdanović, published in: Manual Work (exhib. cat.), Remont, Belgrade 2012.