Malala Yousafzai

Malala Yousafzai is probably one of the bravest people on the face of the earth. This week, she was shot in the head and neck by Taliban members as she was leaving school. She's 14, and the reason they shot her was because she's been a global advocate for the rights of woman and girls, and their education for years; since she was 11 actually. This tiny person was targeted by the Taliban. Targeted, meaning she was a threat... a 14 year old girl was a threat to men who carry guns like they're permanently attached to their hips. I read dozens of news articles regarding the shooting, and one said something along the lines of, "...it shocked an unshockable country (Pakistan)" This was really poignant. Think about it. We get shocked when we see a show like Fear Factor, where people eat bugs and voluntarily fling themselves from skyscrapers. For the people of Pakistan, for example, they have endured so much they are "unshockable". Actually they'd probably think some crazy westerner was nuts for flinging themselves off a skyscraper too. But the sentence was thought provoking for sure. The shooting of Malala has shocked the world, I think, and rightly so. We should be shocked! Everyone should hear her story and that's what I've been thinking these last few days.

I have been working predominantly on this blog for the greater part of this year, on - at times - very political subjects. The Internet is a space of global sharing where you can say and do as you please (as I have many times reiterated, apologies) with less potential scrutiny then perhaps if you were to be physically expressing the information or ideas you release on your blog or other social media forum. It does not mean that those who blog or express themselves via digital means are not subject to potential physical abuse or are not held accountable for their words or actions, I just mean that I can write this post about Malala Yousafzai and if someones reading it, if so inclined, could post a comment saying something along the lines of "shut your blabbering pie hole", or numerous variations. Unless of course they were my neighbour and could egg my house or light my rubbish bin on fire... don't do it.

So you get what I mean.
It's a place to share, like sharing has never been done before!

This year I've especially looked at Jacques Ranciere and his writings like The Emancipated Spectator and the Ignorant Schoolmaster. I've studied and experimented with The Emancipated Spectator mostly and have been really interested in Relational Aesthetics, and replacing the word 'viewer' with 'Interlocutor' ("someone who is involved in a conversation" - Cambridge Dictionary), a term introduced to me by Andy. Simply, I wanted my work to be open to anyone and everyone, non discriminatory, non assuming or dictatorial. I think it's wiggled it's way through different forms and mediums, and ended up (surprisingly!) here, my research blog for Year II. In addition to this, the aspect of vast advancements in technology to create a futuristic, perhaps, utopic or distopic world in the novels and films of Science Fiction (big nerd) has also been a heavy interest for me this year, starting at the very beginning with my newspaper paintings.This relates to my blog in so many ways, as I said before, this is sharing platform which has never been done before. This advancement in our own world, has opened up communication into a whole new realm and it's only just beginning. It's changed our human nature; the way we encounter eachother and the world around us. We are living two lives at once, one in the digital and one in the physical.

Is this post, if not all posts, the embodiment of this thinking? A sharing of information, not dictatorial in nature but evoking in thought and potential activation. Perhaps a "share" or a "like" will occur, as we often use these actions to express a confirmation of listening or agreement. Maybe a disgruntled comment or a further action to dismantle the very forum I'm working on.
These are the ideas of my work, that have grown from the paintings in March, of creepy trees on the foreground of American Newspapers.

As for Malala Yousafzai, maybe I can help to share her story of courage and compassion. At 14 years old she's got more bravery then many people I've met in my life.

On wednesday, surgeons operated to remove the bullet that was lodged so close to her brain, and she survived! Amazing! Perhaps she will live to tell her own story, and tell the Taliban to shove it up their ass.

Read about Malala and her survival here

(One of many, many articles)