Artist’s Project: word play/power play

Abstract

word play/power play acts as an intervention into the public space of the pages of this special issue of Public Art Dialogue. It intervenes in public habits of symbolic domination by calling for action to end gender inequality and the curtailment of women’s voices. In word play/power play, I consider textiles, knitting, craft, and fashion as mediums that foreground the importance of women’s public speech. The works are linguistic expressions to end the inequality of patriarchy through creating an “outside voice”; a scream for the collective pain that women endure. This scream includes the many different intersections where feminine subjectivities are formed, and their vastly different stories. I wish to resist the curtailment of women’s public speech by playing with language and form in the public space, and to speak the need for action and resistance boldly. The work is intended as a subversion of feminine domesticity and the marginalization of women’s work as less than. To energize and attract the eye, the colors are bright and contrast each other; at times they are dissonant, not soft or neutral, passive or receding. Inspired by vintage cycling garments, the digitally knitted statements make reference to the dynamism required to take action, to recreate our culture together.