strike

A "strike" can take many forms: a sudden blow, a percussive hit, a refusal, an act of collective interruption. The word carries violence, rhythm, and dissent all at once. What these gestures have in common is their evasion of capture even as they brush against the traditions of the world’s most famous femicide: the myth of Carmen.

strike begins at a point of exhaustion following the endless repetition of Carmen's life and ultimately her death. Across centuries of adaptation she has been fetishized, moralized, romanticized, and punished. Yet she continues to return, or rather be resurrected - summoned by our desire and projections. Carmen is at once familiar and controversial: a beloved cliché, a femme fatale, “the devil” according to her jealous lover, a rebellious bird that refuses to be caged.