This series of photographs investigates the intersection of reality and art through the recurring image of a subway window. The directive “Do Not Lean,” commonly printed in red on subway doors, becomes a framing device as it passes over dilapidated post-Soviet landscapes in Yerevan. The images navigate the tension between what lies outside the window and the act of framing that reality within art. Borrowing from both mimetic traditions and modernist notions of “art for art’s sake,” the windows function as gazes, conscious of the socio-cultural context that shapes perception. The black frame of the window and the text merge visually with collapsing architecture, signaling the disintegration of past ideologies and the precarious existence of post-Soviet spaces. In this overlap, the fragility of the human body resonates with the fragility of the built environment, showing how personal and collective identities are entangled with cultural and ideological structures. Through this interplay of text and image, the work reflects on how perception is never neutral but mediated through signs, memory, and context.

Medium: Print Paper / Light Box
Dimensions: A3
Date: 2006