Identity Research

Our identity is our tax code and passport, or perhaps something that remains in our memory; the memory of those with whom we have walked a path together. Or it is what is true/real and beautiful, a trace of light, of awareness, the journey or the path itself.
Through art, I transmit the light that illuminates me from within.

The wall of time has a hole
through which my face can be seen
 Sohrab Sepehri

In this era, human identity is undergoing a transformation, and from now on, ethnic or religious belonging will no longer be the primary source of a person’s identity. Modern human identity is fragmented and broken into pieces, like a rhizome, that tangle of roots that Gilles Deleuze used as a metaphor. Unlike a tree, which has a central root, a defined direction of growth, and a regulated structure, the rhizome is a plant without a center that grows in a disorderly and unpredictable way. Even when it is broken, it can continue to grow in another direction and carry on its existence.

The rhizome is a force of connection and otherness, and it makes the creation of infinite networks possible. The rhizome has neither beginning nor end: it is always somewhere in between. Its identity is constantly changing, and it is an agent of permanent metamorphosis. Unlike the tree, it is not the result of reproduction but is anti-genealogical. Its memory is short-term and therefore stands against memory understood as structured remembrance.

Sepideh Sarlak