THE GOLDEN CAGE: A PULIC REHEARSAL, 2021

A PUBLIC REHEARSAL
40 Min
Bodies, un-protected, Mousonturm, Frankfurt, November 2021

Not a play, not a video film, not an installation, not a script, it was a public rehearsal.

The amateur actors, including myself, turned their backs to the audience and read an epic poem written from the perspective of the state apparatus, which told the non-linear story of the Kelaynak birds. Meaningless utterances occasionally broke the self-gratifying administrative voice. This piece was performed as a public rehearsal, with many broken parts, mistakes, awkward pauses, and broken English.

Later, this project was developed further for an installation and performance, presented at the Aga Khan Museum, Toronto, and Mousonturm, Frankfurt, summer of 2022.

This project focuses on the Syrian-Turkish border, a region I have explored through multiple research trips since 2018. As the centerpiece of this work, I chose the northern bald ibis (known as “kelaynak” in Turkish), the most endangered migratory bird in the Middle East. With its distinctive bare, red face and neck and long, narrow feathers, this unique bird has become a powerful symbol for the project.

When Palmyra fell to ISIS, the kelaynak colony, which migrates from Northeast Africa to the Turkish-Syrian border, faced near extinction. In March 2016, the state-operated Birecik Kelaynak Reproduction Center confined the birds during their migration period, choosing not to release them to protect the fragile population.

“The Golden Cage” examines the layers of confinement amidst the unending catastrophes in the region. It is a poetic exploration of artifacts, ruins, water bodies, and living organisms scattered across a heavily nationalized and contested landscape. The cage, as a state-controlled symbol, is reimagined through translated texts to evoke complex and contradictory ideas about borders, migration, entrapment, and untranslatability. These sacred birds, with their rich historical, archaeological, and symbolic significance, serve as metaphors for this performative piece.