Yassine Khaled
Visual Artist
A Territory Under MaMa, 2017
A Territory Under MaMa evokes questions about balance, spirituality and power relations. The works refer to the vague balance of institutional and political power while they resonate with the exhibition space; all the works merge into the exhibition walls. A Territory Under MaMa explores the impressions of measure and power dimensions with a playful touch that resonates with the current events.
The work called Trump creates a vision of a huge paper airplane that leans on an egg. This sculpture speaks about contemplation and the keeping balance, through a gesture which may seem natural, but actually stresses the nerves in concentration. Pivotal in the work is the egg, it is placed in the centre of the pressure created by the airplane. The egg
has a connection to religion as a symbol of the empty tomb of Christ and also as a traditional symbol of fertility and rebirth. The central idea of the work, the attempt to balance the giant and heavy ”paper airplane” by placing it to lean on something unstable as an egg, has a strong connection with our time and politics.
Leaking Corner creates an effect that pervades the whole space. I placed wads of Good Zero -bills, a series which I designed already in 2009, ”behind a wall”. The composition of the work creates an illusion where the wads look like they are coming from a space behind the broken wall. Leaking Corner alludes to the financial crisis and the fast
movements of virtual money.
Paradise Without Trees is my interpretation of Leonardo da Vinci’s St. John the Baptist. It is a direct drawing on the wall and connects with spirituality and the history of art.
The installation Love Me opens up psychological questions with physical experiences. It explores the perspectives of everyday life, and enlightens the viewers by making them to participate in the spatial and the visual dimensions of the artwork. The visuality and the meaning of the installation become complete with the experience of the viewers.
Love Me aims to break up boundaries between viewers and the installation, and to transmit a clear image to the spectators that they can engage with. It creates an experience where a sense of reality changes to a sense of having a dream. The viewers can visit a reconstruction of a dream, even if the dream doesn’t necessarily give any concept of dreams but of reality itself. When experiencing the installation, everything there seems to instantly grasp on your consciousness, and thus create a feeling that you are inside some reality.
The combination of a sculpture and installation also creates a surrealistic vision of Statue of Eirene, the Goddess of Peace, carrying a child with her left arm — Plutus, the god of wealth from ancient Greek religion and myth. The original statue of Cephisodotus the Elder is an allegory for Plutus prospering under the protection of Peace; it once constituted a public appeal to good sense.