SLS-ART-29 · Obra única (1/1)

Swept Under the Rug, Surrendered to the Sun

Maryam (Maya) Tohidi · Irán

Técnica

Alfombra y pintura acrílica sobre panel solar, con secretos enviados de forma anónima (sweptunder.live)

Año

2026

Edición

Obra única (1/1)

Texto del artista

Growing up in Iran, “sweeping things under the rug” was a survival mechanism: a way to navigate a world where personal truths often had to remain hidden. Over time, I turned to writing and art as tools for processing these silences, aspiring toward vulnerability and freedom. At the center of the work lies a Persian rug, a symbol of home and heritage that often doubles as a hiding place for the things we cannot share publicly. Beneath the rug, and spilling across the glass of a decommissioned solar panel, is a “mountain” of unspoken truths. These are not just my own; they represent a collective weight. I have gathered secrets and challenging feelings that others have kept hidden (dozens of anonymous submissions from around the world via my project, www.sweptunder.live) and hand-written these fragments into a jumbled, illegible landscape, transforming private burdens into a visible topography. Though this panel no longer generates electricity, it serves as a new kind of conductor for our shared humanity. The trace of the mountains depicted on the rug, inspired by the rugged peaks of Iran, extends outward, blurring the line between the physical geography of my homeland and the emotional “mountains” we build when we suppress our truth. Crowning the piece is a glowing sun, a bridge between the solar panel’s original purpose and the Zoroastrian faith. Originating thousands of years ago in ancient Persia, Zoroastrianism holds light and the sun as the ultimate witnesses to Asha, divine truth and cosmic order. By placing these “swept” secrets directly beneath the sun’s gaze, the artwork moves them from the shadows into a space of surrender. Here, the secrets are no longer hidden; they are illuminated, neutralized, and finally set free under the eternal watch of the radiant sun.

Sobre el artista

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