Sümeyye Öztürk Ulu

Silk / Worm and Dragonfly

In the edited video art piece “Silk/Worm”, part of “Silk/Worm and Dragonfly”, Sümeyye Öztürk Ulu uses silkworm as a metaphor for women with headscarves who were stripped of their right to be themselves against all of their hard work during the February 28 Process, but who managed to carry on with their education, careers and stories. In a documentary format, Öztürk Ulu criticizes how others constantly talked about them.

The secluded crevice on which the video is played alludes to the cocoon the silkworm cannot get out of. Right next to it, the video projected on the wall shows a Dragonfly, an insect offering a criticism of how persons/ institutions and perhaps the society at large remained immovable in the face of events happening in an immovable order. Discriminatory practices of the time labeled people as women, men, those with headscarf and those without headscarf, which are brought into focus in the dimensions of the Silk/Worm and Dragonfly, the physical effort they make, the narrative language in the video and how they sharply contrast with the surface their image is projected upon.