Working on the Stereotype: Mona Hatoum and Gülsün Karamustafa

Abstract

Informed by postcolonial theory, this essay analyzes the works of various women artists primarily Mona Hatoum, Gülsün Karamustafa, Emily Jacir, and Aydan Murtezaoğlu. The author demonstrates the artists’ desire to reject stereotypical perceptions of Muslim women and to deconstruct the image of the Muslim veil either as a symbol of oppression, or as a form of an erotic exoticism, both in the West and in their home countries. Their work is discussed with reference to clichés surrounding Muslim women, from the mysterious eroticism of the veil and harems in traditional Western art to contemporary rhetoric about the vulnerability of “oppressed” Muslim women in need of a white male savior. The author also reveals the artists’ criticism of attitudes to women in their countries of birth, and the ambiguity of their own identity as women located both inside and outside the hegemonic discourse. It is shown that the binary oppositions of man/woman and Orient/Occident are inadequate ways of understanding living reality.