Tangible things

Tangible things

Tangible things invite readers to look closely at the world around them—ordinary objects like the food on their plate, and abstract elements like safety pins attached to leaves. Through human-centric ideas, we assign meaning to everything. In a world obsessed with the virtual, tangible things are once again making history—with humans at the center of it.

This work suggests that almost any material object, when examined closely, can serve as a link between the present and the past. As meaning-making machines, humans constantly reinterpret the world around them. In this collection—like in some of my other works—I attempt to translate photographs into sculpture, preserving documentation through memory. I aim to create a historical memory of forgotten regions. I'm especially interested in how images are translated across cultures. How much does the meaning of documentary photography change over time, especially when shifting focus from the Middle East to the United States?

This plant was just a small bud when I first placed safety pins on its leaves. The pins symbolized the elements that society adds to our understanding of self—things we are not born with. I see the plant as a metaphor for subjectivity. The plant has grown, but the pins—representing religions, beliefs, and ideologies—remain. We often seek to remove what society imposes on our identity, whether real or imagined. Yet the traces of these ideologies persist, even when they are no longer visible. Still, the plant continues to grow.