Flosser
vintage mannequin hands, floss
dimensions variable
2016
Mannequin hands, fingers severed, reach out from fixed positions on a wall. In some cases, depicting a triangle; in other cases, reaching out from inscribing a straight line, animating into a chorus-like trio, or stuck solitarily, but all reaching for connection with the viewer or perhaps the other hands. Floss entangles whatever fingers remain, constraining but also holding the hands together, whether caught in the repose of a gesture or twisting in anguish. Flosser alludes to the silence of undocumented sweatshop workers who use their bodies more fully for the experience of lived work, but who must otherwise restrain themselves at the perimeters of society. The silence might be regarded as symbolic of their legal condition, or because modern capitalism’s decimation of unions and syndicates has rendered workers’ voices—their human rights—mute. When we floss, though it preserves part of us, it impedes our ability to speak.