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Pillows
Amela Hadžimejlić
November 2016
Playfulness on the pillow
"Do not be a philosopher in the text that you write for this exhibition," said Amela Hadžimejlić to me ,the author of graphic pillows that you see in front of you. Even if I were a philosopher, I think, , for which there are some (un) reasonable doubt, I would not be in this case. Because, at the first sight of these artifacts, how nicely it says , you can see something you do not see too often, something that awakens memories of the time and people who have implanted our culture that we have, first unconsciously, and then understanding the world around them, adopted . And maybe we formed some important life decisions and set some through - art and (or) philosophy, anyway - wanting to stay in that sensibility that we brought from our pillows into the world as a kind of amulet, a secret thought that was ( too) serious world we live in,that is the highest possible to some extent, remain a child. That is, to have that playfulness. Because important things in art are however won in the end or at the beginning of the game.
At a time of consumerism in which we constantly want someone or something to give "importance" or "seriousness" recourse to such deep intimistic works and techniques, may seem a bit adventurous and anachronistic. But the art is the most of it - isn't it? Not agreeing to dictation time, do not move within the given framework in which today's conventional (and commercial) art prefer some kind of update social context. In regard to creating an atmosphere that makes that context unordinary, if it is "ordinary", or sets it to the possibility of different viewing and interpretation.
In this sense, one can say that the pillow is very reliable basis for art: it is what we first put our head on,our first dreams are moving out of it , it is our first idea, it is our first toy, and the first confessional, it entrust the first secrets , first love, and the first bad news, we cry in it for the first time,it is the first thing we lie down on and from it most of the soul goes to heaven, or where it is certain that our lives will continue. Or finishes,as you like it.
What these pillows tell us is that someone's life and even art obtain their contours long before what we have the opportunity to see as a "final" product. That is because we live in a world where people are, in fact, figures and case studies, and this is at best. This is not just profoundly inhuman, but it is not true: an essential initiator of our being are the emotional state called love, and spiritual (up) grade that we call - awareness. There are still no '' point contract" which are called conventions, prejudices, material wealth; unscrupulousness everything that we experience every day and watch as a substitute for our own life. Our conception of the world, at least the part that we carry in ourselves as the best of us is attacked by the materials that makes it thinner day by day, and how to get to the question, when will the world - if it is not already - become quite limited space for some strong for predators? For others, the weaker ones, those who believe in a more nuanced and balanced view of the world, in their pillows and their ornaments, that the world does not have and will not be the place.
Often, after passing "all circle" in terms of studying and experiencing art practices we realize that we determine some "first" fact, some early influences that we thought were God-given: like, for example, the first watching of Professor Balthazar, or series that have refined our childhood by their skills, such as "Poletarac" or ''Nedeljni Zabavnik'', that was hand-drawn and painted by masterpieces of Dusan Petricic and inspiration of genius screenwriter Timothy John Byford. As if all desires, hopes, all past and all future are built in that pillows of Amela Hadžimejlić.
After all, design or embroidery on pillow are first artistic ornament which man sees doesn't he?
Then it is no wonder that she can draw and write on them everything or what the artist is occupied by and creates her dilemma. To fully enjoyment of these works it is enough to start from the title from the'' Women's'', through'' As the sky feels the soul'', ''As the rain falls'', and'' Crying'', Ouh, '' I'll buy you a cannon'' and'' Life is only one'','' Do not believe me when rain falls'', ''Everything will go away'' and''If the night lasted longer''. This sequence suggests us to a kind of visual jazz, some intimate multimedia, that putting their thoughts and art at the same time would like to underline what is truly important and what is to replacement for the children's playfulness we are looking at social networks, mobile phones, on our computers ... Associative series makes us that all these collages merge from progressive spirit of the seventies, from the model of pop-culture, but also from the heritage to which the artist comes later, studying of what was being doing during the time and was being deposited in a medium that she is engaged.
Title'' Hey, open the door'', is a quote from an ancient pop hit from the seventies, when the author was a child. And this is at the same time the message that the modern man fight against his closed world, from uncertain choices, into something better, more open, more intimate and brighter. Or darker but more honest, but closer to what the human nature and art should be.
These pillows as if to say - you can take me everything, but not the right to be playful by my nature to be in some way (and) a child. If an artist owes anybody anything, and we know that he does not need to explain or justify, then he owes it to that first thing it could determine. There's a great song from the seventies, Epitaph, the cult band King Crimson, whose one verse says: Confusion will be my epitaph. In relatively freely translation, it could be said as - "On my tombstone will be writen'' the confusion."
And on the pillow? Or "pillows" !? There will be written; curiosity, emotion, faith, hope, doubt, all these things that make the pillows you are looking at unique. And playful.
In this text, it was not so hard to be philosopher. It was enough to let the playfulness.
Ahmed Burić
(transltation Kanita Dizdarević)