Paper short abstract:

This project, which is submitted as a presentation of artistic work, is consisted of a series of interactive sculptures, focusing on the subjects of home and homelessness, displacement and immigration with regard to the contexts of power, control and politics.

Paper long abstract:

The Games and Toys series is consisted of a body of interactive sculptures which are designed based on the structures of international, as well as traditional Persian toys, such as top toy, maze toy and Tablak which have taken the shapes of border lines, maps, world map projections and flags. Games are considered as collective activities in which people are able to engage merely by accepting a set of conventional rules and laws which define the implications and purposes of these activities, much similar to political, cultural and social conventions. In this body of works, these pieces which may be considered as visual interpretations and depictions of issues such as displacement and immigration from my point of view and based on my experience, are created in hope of encouraging questions about the ongoing problematizations of home and homelessness, migration crisis, power and powerlessness, control, isolation and inclusiveness with regard to their political and cultural contexts. In almost all the pieces, female and male smaller than life-size crouching figures have replaced the balls of the original toys. These figures, which are replaced with the multiplied 3-D printed version of my own body in more recent pieces, are recurrent in my works, signifying powerlessness and passiveness.