MIKA REVELL
THE BONDAGE OF COSTUME
I started this work while living in Tokyo, interrogating the female experience observed and experienced in the city. The single word I felt best described the culture of Japan was "contradiction". The complex culture exists in a tenuous balance, and seems to teeter between ancient tradition, irreverence, and over-consumption.
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I became occupied with the lack of acknowledgment — or perhaps deliberate invisibility — of the contradictions regarding females. I chose to highlight the duality of femininity, strength vs. fragility, freedom vs. enslavement, and symbol vs. human. Costuming became a physical meditation for me on the mutation of our roles in society. Whether in the traditional kimono, schoolgirl uniform, or the ropes of a Shibari master, these figures are restricted and ideas or archetypes are projected upon them. The paintings eventually dissolved the figures altogether, demonstrating the power of the costume alone.​
