by shanshan mo
Acrylic, oil, charcoal on canvas
h: 45 w: 120 d: 2 (cms).
This painting extends the exploration of identity under pressure, where language becomes both tool and trap. A bird with scissor-like beak cuts the tongue of the figure—an act of violent silencing. Behind them, sheep circle a central pillar in quiet, mindless repetition, referencing Francis Alÿs’s Cuentos Patrióticos (1997). In this borrowed gesture, collective obedience meets personal trauma: the muted figure becomes a vessel for the cost of assimilation in a bilingual, unstable environment. As speech is severed, the landscape fades,the voice erased, the home receding.