from: Art au Centre, Liège
to: Greylight Projects, Heerlen
Mikail Koçak (1989, Malmedy) lives and works in Liège (BE).
A sometimes obsolete avatar, brandished daily around the world by radical nationalists, the flag is here reduced to the rank of a household towel. Doesn’t this mischievous diversion evoke the other side of the coin behind the symbol of national unity? “Trimer pour mieux mourir”* (economic and social inequalities), “ne pas mélanger les torchons et les serviettes”** (rejecting immigrants and their descendants, but whose labour force is accepted as contributing to the country’s GDP), the dream of “laver son linge sale en famille” (racist, xenophobic, misogynistic tendencies and totalitarian fantasies that have never been extinguished).
* “Trimming to die for” ** “don’t mix tea towels and napkins” *** “washing one’s dirty laundry as a family”