Kelimeler Kıyafetsiz (: Words Naked/Are Not Enough) – Monuments I – V

Kelimeler Kıyafetsiz is a research project on representations of Women in political speech from Turkey. Quotes that refer to Women are extracted from public speeches of current Turkish politicians and re-presented in forms inspired by archaeological artifacts that celebrate Male glory, namely Orkhon Inscriptions, Assyrian Lion Hunt Reliefs, the Theodisian Obelisk and the Altar of Zeus. The text posits Turkish women as the “ornament of their house”, and a non-equal but complementary counterpart to Turkish Men. To reflect this sentiment, the work has bifurcated to house non-equal but a complementary counterpart: A set of golden mouth accessories that cage the lips of its wearer in tezhip : an Ottoman manuscript illumination style. Like Turkish Woman ornaments the house of her Man, tezhip ornaments the house of the word, the page.