“Yoke” performance is one of the series of the art interventions of the “Exhibit” project.
In the “traditional Russian welding” suit, as well as with a yoke, specially designed for the action, Weld Queen specially attends art exhibitions and acts as a work of art. By her performance, the artist represents the collective image of a Russian woman, strong, capable of carrying a heavy weight on her shoulders, and at the same time fragile and vulnerable. At the same time, a yoke with buckets is the metaphor of life burden, which each person carries on his shoulders, filling these “vessels of life” with the content of his world-view. This performance is a study of how women’s self-identification is modernized under the conditions of the industrialized and emancipated world. Now she is a welder who is able to work on a par with men with such a complex and unyielding material, she is strong and self-confident, but despite this, she remains a woman.
January 2018.
Center for Contemporary Art “Vinzavod”, Moscow.