Swallow | Kataposis

Swallow | Kataposis | 2019
Medium: edible inject print
(Edible sugar paper, edible blue ink)
Dimensions: A4
| Swallow, verb: 1. (Throat) To take in through the mouth and esophagus into the stomach, 2. (Accept) To accept without question, protest or resentment. 3. (Take away) If something large swallows (up) another thing, it makes it disappear or stop existing separately by making it part of itself.|

A basic human necessity for survival, food is more than just nourishment, it relates to concepts of pleasure and disgust. Among other things, it connects with notions of consuming, thinking and acceptance. Many aspects of our social and cultural life are expressed and experienced in terms of food. Eating is viewed as a metaphor for religion, sex, gender, social status, as well as group (ethnic, cultural, national) identity. The work “Swallow”, consists of edible sugar papers (size A4, number, variable) printed with edible blue ink, stacked in a pile and placed on a table. The sugar pages are printed in Greek language, with verses of the Greek national anthem,"Hymn to Liberty" a poem written by Dionisios Solomos,1823. The artwork is as an interactive installation that involves the participation of the viewer, whose choice is provoked by the dilemma to eat, swallow, take a bite, have a taste, smell, the print of the national anthem, or not. Either, or, the viewer’s standpoint activates and reveals the meaning of the artwork, which it reflects on cross cultural, linguistic food expressions, common in Greek and English, such as: “You are what you eat, Swallow your pride, Swallow your words, A hard story to swallow, Eat or be eaten, What's eating you, Food for thought “ and so on. Swallow is, posing questions on the construction and deconstruction of identity and our sense of belonging, at a time that the fundamental principles of democracy are under attack, scrutiny and a cause for debate.

*The work Swallow is inspired and takes its title from the movie “Swallow”, where the main character, is a depressed pregnant woman having an existential crisis caused by past family abuse. In her struggle to adapt and conform to the strict and hypocritical norms of her new married life, she behaves like a borderline personality, swallowing non-nutritional foreign objects in a vain search of herself.