Houda Ghorbel
“Always on the pedestal, the veil imposes itself as a subject chosen to create a diversion or another debacle in the name of religion. For or against, mandatory or not, conflicting opinions and divergent arguments are like a torrent of useless nonsense.
The artist has installed three heads of veiled women of different ages. Through their fixed and expressionless features, each sculpture emerges in silence as a mixture of patience and resistance to multi-faced violence.
I’m that little four-year old girl who was subjected to any ideology. My head is veiled and my hair confined under a piece of cloth, far from the caresses of the sun and raindrops. My convictions are sealed and my veil is my friend for life.
I am the beautiful young woman in a veil of fine lace that hides half of my face. My great fault is my beauty, which they are ashamed of or rather fear. I have accepted that I am obliged to obscure and conceal myself under a totalitarian patriarchal regime that is terrified of the idea of a free woman. Silence is my only option until I have enough courage to rebel.
I am the mature woman whose face and skull are mutilated by bullet holes. Zealots killed me because I dared to express thoughts. They exploit my veil as their instrument to use weapons, and they destroy my confidence and my integrity by hiding my beauty and belittling my intellect.”
Text written by Neila Mhiri and translated by Anne Marie Butler
