This piece was created for an exhibition at the artist-run space Paper Mountain. Entitled “Drowning” this piece depicts a man made of thread drowning in his identity. The figure depicted is a character from an old story found around the world entitled “Blue Beard”. In the story, Blue Beard is a monstrous character having murdered every wife he ever had. The part I found interesting was the need to differentiate him as a monster by giving him an obscure feature. As if a physical difference sets him apart as an evil person. Throughout all the tales found around the world with the same storyline, the protagonist has a defining feature whether a blue beard or a fox’s snout and ears. I wanted to create a piece that uses the story to show that we can sometimes feel trapped, typecast and suffocated by the labels others give us due to our appearance.

Artist: Marwa Fahmy

Photography: Marwa Fahmy