75 x 50 cm – £ 1,700
This piece talks about the state of every single person in the moment he loses a very important thing in his life, looking at it being disintegrated in front of his eyes. The people in war-torn Syria lost their entire lives, they lost children, family, hopes and dreams. Every single day they were faced with the same threats. From losing their homes and neighbourhoods to having their mothers and daughters raped and killed in front of them. This art piece expresses the exact feeling one would have the moment he or she loses the last piece they were holding on to or the last bit in this world that kept them somewhat sane. And then, it’s lost, and they are disoriented, lost and completely devastated.
No one can describe in any way the feeling when you see your childhood memories, notebooks and thoughts being bombed, with one missile hitting your home after the other. The addition of lights and shadow is a symbol for the devastating condition when you hear the voices of your children in the corner of what was once your home and see their spirits running around and calling for you to come and see them, play with them. You notice your mother’s reading glasses on the sofa, with your wife’s sewing needle laying there on her chair, all just waiting for them to come and collect them, but they never will. Then you hear the voices again getting closer and louder until eventually, you turn into a creature with a human-like shape, trying to understand how and why this has happened, but you end up with nothing.
All art pieces are made from reclaimed wood signifying rebirth and the possibility for hope in the future. The wood used in this piece was retrieved from the surviving parts of a wardrobe from a shelled home in rural Damascus.