Ćilim 2.5

Ćilim 2.5 is a computer-generated kilim (traditional woven carpet or tapestry) that questions the patriarchal interpretations of contemporary technology and traditional crafts. By transferring the kilim motifs into a digital form, the work stands as a place of reflection on the way we interpret worth based on associations to gender.

In Tanovićs work, patterns of the kilim, made of computer-generated particles, morph in an endless loop. A verse from the old Bosnian folk tune “Ja navila iveraču” (tr. “I rolled the cloth”) repeats with increasing robotic distortion. In just five iterations, the voice shifts from fully human, raw and comprehensible, into an unrecognizable glitch. The particles shiver with sound.

Traditional kilim weaving, with its motifs and colors, is among the most reinterpreted visual elements of Bosnian-Herzegovinian culture: from the logo of the Sarajevo ’84 Olympics, to various applications by brands and organizations that seemingly seek to evoke a kind of patriotism through its aesthetics. These symbols appear to be used superficially, mainly as decoration, without a deeper context beyond labeling something as Bosnian-Herzegovinian.

The artist’s late grandmother spent a part of her life weaving kilims. As a young woman, she lived in eastern Herzegovina, in a village near Gacko. A kilim trader from the region would travel to Dubrovnik to resell such handmade works for good profit. When he first came to buy her kilims, she valued her work highly and asked a price her husband and her father-in-law found too high. The trader accepted immediately, and she created a new source of income for the household through her work.

Amer Tanović became interested in this kind of symbolism of the kilim. In his research, he examines whether the kilim, as a form of women’s financial contribution to the household at a time when such a role was neither expected nor desired, served as a way to disrupt the patriarchal patterns within which it was woven and is interpreted.

Some ethnologists link the recurring motifs of triangles and rhombi to Neolithic cultures. There, they occur in cults of the Sun or the figure of Great Mother, celebrating femininity, fertility, and bonds with nature. The decorative use of kilim in the current century would imply the meanings of these symbols are long decontextualized and mostly forgotten. The artist understands this at itself can stand as a reflection of how femininity is treated in patriarchy.

In context of today’s rhetoric of masculinity spreading through technological discourse, the traditional symbols of the Kilims could act as a counterpoint. Conservative tones in the tech industry, under a growing wave of right-wing politics, shape views on technology and digital spaces. Formerly liberal “tech-bro” CEOs now speak of curtailing diversity in the online space, of the need for more “masculine energy.” Freedom of speech is used to justify aggressive spreading of these views and the hatred that follows, along with a selective censorship. The impression arises that technology and the digital space begin to serve the narrowing of the framework of accepted ways of human being and thinking, with ever stronger emphasis on conservative values and authoritarian views of masculinity. Generative art opens space for thinking about technology outside imposed frameworks. Technology does not have to be exclusively a symbol of control and capitalist progress; it can also be a space for sensitivity, openness, and transformation.

With this computer-generated kilim, Tanović strives to create a space for thinking of what happens when femininity, in all its forms, confronts the world of algorithms, systems, and ideologies that aim toward control and homogeneity.

With thanks to Zulfikar Filandra.

With support of ifa, Goethe Institute Sarajevo and Ars Aevi Museum Sarajevo.