The Lost Key of a National Anthem

2025

Site-Specific Textile Installation Featuring Text and Drawings, Two Folders in a Bookshelf, and Photographs in an Archival Box

In Myanmar, women from various faiths navigate complex challenges that are deeply rooted in the country's colonial past. This history disrupted traditional lifestyles and left behind lasting social and cultural scars, including heightened moral panics surrounding Islam. The military has long leveraged a nationalist agenda, using Buddhism to enforce a patriarchal narrative that claims to protect both Buddhist and Muslim women while simultaneously tightening its political grip.

Created during a period of exile in Berlin, this work examines how women’s physical, emotional, and intellectual experiences are continually manipulated under cultural and religious pretexts. This theme resonates globally, particularly in the context of rising right-wing nationalism in Europe.

At its essence, *The Lost Key of a National Anthem* challenges the laws and ideologies that restrict women's autonomy, specifically Myanmar’s 2015 “Race and Religion Protection Laws,” which aimed to control aspects of marriage, monogamy, and religious belief. Through the use of textiles, text, and archival materials, the installation serves as a reflective exploration of belonging, control, and the fragile notion of protection, which often masquerades as domination.