Curated by Lynn del Sol

Shown in conjunction with Creative Thriftshop

The Green Zone – the International Zone in Iraq – is a heavily guarded diplomatic area of closed-off streets in central Baghdad where US personnel live and work. It is completely surrounded by high concrete blast walls and barbed wire. Access is only available through a handful of entry points, all of which are controlled by armed guards. It is the American military’s heavily fortified and painstakingly Americanized home – The Green Zone residents eat standard American food, almost all of it brought in from abroad. They have an elaborate gym, satellite TV, computers, DVDs, and telephones with U.S. area codes, as well as a bar known as the “Country Club” – the place to go for Cuban cigars, fresh cuts of beef and a decent wine. The Green Zone is a little America in the middle of a war zone embedded in the heart of Baghdad. Contrary to popular belief, the Green Zone is lush and tropical – It’s a perfect Middle Eastern paradise.

It is a famous paradox that walls that protect you also hem you in. In the hands of the artist duo Guerra de la Paz, this absurd unreality serves as a catalyst for the discussion of the sociopolitical effects that such fictitious fortresses create in society. Through the use of the discarded abundance of the American lifestyle, these artists compose a grand fabric interpretation of an idealized landscape. The idyllic scenery is fashioned out of discarded garments, hand picked from mountainous piles of clothing designated to over flowing landfills created by our disposable culture. The artists’ interest in the recycled object as an art medium examines the western concepts of cultural ownership and fictitious ideologies. Tree trunks made of tons of clothing weigh heavy on the ground, brown pants, sweaters, and jackets are industriously twisted into life like roots lolling around the gallery floor. Overhead a canopy forms where green garments hang gently down and sways in the breeze.

No strangers to large provocative installations, Guerra de la Paz in these works as in others: Oasis (2006); Pieta (2005); Eden (2003) and Overflow (2002), pricks at America’s cultural conflicts – seeking to define struggle, victory, and failure – while taking society’s belongings and parading them about is as if to say, “No really, the emperor has no clothes.” Though presented as a sheltered oasis of a sort, the forest beckons the viewers forward leading them towards a distant red light where the artists’ presentation of the sculpture Martyr – a lone camouflage clad crucified figure hangs ominously on a pristine white wall. This sculpture stands as a personification of the ideals of universal sacrifice, which is freely sequestered from all its citizens lost to endless political plots for control and domination. A symbol of defiance and faith, whether a pawn of government or a true devote, here the artists are able to draw parallels between the two images that incarnate dialogue, questioning and defying authority.

– Lynn del Sol