MAMAISM

Domestic Readymades

Senior Thesis Project 2022
BFA Integrated Design 

MAMAISM is a movement “re-domestifying” iconic  Dada era images into the female context  of  the industry. Domestic arts - knitting, corchet, ceramics, sewing, handicrafting, decorating, even cooking  and cleaning -  have long been considered “low art” due to their association with  women in the hom. However, these housewife tasks are bursting with vitality, utility, and love. Crocheting is  a form of healing, sewing is a way to express love, and ironing your clothes becomes blissfully mundane. Instead of  showing beautiful  forms of textiles  and crafts made with and for care, art museums include “industrial junk” and sexualized imagery from artists like Marcel Duchamp, Man Ray, and Salvador Dali. Each artist had  a  kind of  disguise they operated  under. Marcel Duchamp dresssed as Rrose Selavy, Man Ray was just a nickname, and Salvador Dali could  barely  createt work consciously.   Taking on the moniker WOMAN RAY, Anna Koch reinserts the femininity of domestic arts into the fine  art  world with worded puns and textile mediums.  To use the wwords of Baroness Elsa von Freytag-Loringhoven, the silenced woman behind the ideas of Dada, Marcel Duchamp?                                    More like Marcel Dushit!