Exhibitions > World War -III 1/2

On the battlefield, there are pluses and minuses—those who are engaged in the middle of war, those who are chased, injured, or killed, and those who lost loved ones. I call the war experienced by those who are not parties to the conflict, yet are swept up in it, “the Minus War.”
Countless victims can be blamed for a massacre under the pretext that they betrayed or provoked first. Schools and hospitals can be bombed with the excuse that they started the conflict. A rape victim can be condemned under the assumption that she was the instigator. We manage to blame the dead, and those who lost their families and homes, using every excuse we can manufacture.
Perhaps only humans cover up their own shame in this way. Human history moves forward by covering violence with more violence. Few people deny that hurting others is evil. Yet, this clear, reasonable, and ethical agreement is flipped upside down whenever specific interests make up excuses. Just like that, people strike and kill.
The ambiguously disguised language used to cover violence with more violence is what I have hung as banners in the exhibition hall. These letters are written in a script of my own creation, so that no one can easily read them. Even if someone manages to decipher the words, they cannot comprehend a language designed to conceal violence. These scattered banners veil and conceal the shivering pink bodies (the sculptures) beneath. In the paintings, the dead and injured victims are presented much like food laid out on a table. The Minus War unfolds here—one that disowns its own violence while continuously veiling and covering up these sacrifices. It is a war of victims where we can no longer distinguish prey from perpetrator, virtue from vice, or who is truly wielding the violence. A Third World War ever draws near, one we do not await, yet which awaits us. World War Minus Three and a Half—a system and program of annihilation—is waiting for us. I have materialized this Minus War through sculptures, paintings, and installations.