12 Paper Dresses
I was in a meeting with my immigration lawyer, in an office in the city of Paris where I live, when she sneezed mid-sentence. I automatically responded with ‘bless you’. She explained to me, as she does many things, that it's no longer chic to say ‘bless you’, much like ‘bon appetit’ because, she further explained, we no longer want to acknowledge the physical existence of our bodies. When did they become embarrassing?
My sculptures are recognisable as ‘sculpture’ when the body is removed from them. It does not take long to understand that it is a dress, and that, as an observation, is simple and true. When the sculpture is morphed and blended into the landscape of the body and its image, it becomes an indiscernible imitation, but then something leaves you asking, ‘Can you wear it?’
The sculptures are as delicate as the oiled paper they’re made from. The photograph, as a modern medium, permanent and irremovable. Yet it is the image's fragility, as a source of information, even decorative, that has become weightless through its ability to betray us. As we continue to remove our bodies physically and intellectually, in a world obsessed with consumption and optimisation, I have spent my time physically fashioning paper into something that degrades this process, in the hope to discover what is, irreplaceably, myself.
Amir Tikriti was born in Los Angeles, California, where he started his art practice in photography. It was in his atelier in Paris, the sculptor was revealed to him, through his compulsive need to oil, slice, staple, clip, tape and hook into form what would eventually become 12 Paper Dresses. The documenting of these ephemeral sculptures were a necessary process to bring his work into conceivable existence. The book and adjoining exhibition entices the viewer to authenticate the works with their own authority, and in the process playfully puts in question the fragile difference between physical reality, and its many representations.