Artist: Giselle Daneshmand
Exhibition: Flight PS752 / Flight 655
Gallery: LBSU School of Art, Max L. Gatov Gallery
Website: giselle-davis.com
Giselle Daneshmand is currently in the last year of pursing a Master of Fine Arts for sculpture at California State Long Beach University, having graduated with a Bachelors of Arts from University of California, Irvine. He works deal with the very hard-hitting and sometimes political issues that face this current world we live in.
This particular exhibition was her Master of Fine Arts thesis show. Despite this installation being her thesis show, it served a more important second purpose. Having known passengers on the most recent flight part of the installation, Flight PS752, this show provided a memorial for the lost lives, marking the 60th day since the event, as is the funeral custom in Iran.
The exhibition Flight PS752 / Flight 655 consisted of three hanging transparent boards with engraved white writing, one white board with white engraved writing posted on the wall, and various cement-like blocks arranged across an open room in the pattern of airplane seats. There were 30 rows with 6 blocks per row marked A-E. As a whole, the scale is large and uniform. The center hanging transparent oard lists the names of the people who died on flight PS752. The transparent board hanging nearer to the Flight 655 side consists of a more historical retelling of the events surrounding the shooting down of that commercial flight of passengers. The board hanging closer to the Flight PS752 side tells a more personal and closely related telling of the passengers on that flight who lost their lives. The white board bolted to the wall between the other boards has a poem engraved as well as the artists’ statement.
This exhibition was most importantly a memorial to those who lost their lives on January 8, 2020 on the Flight PS752. However, this exhibition also explores another flight, Flight 655, where a similar political fight for power resulted in the devastating loss of innocent people. This show is about the very personal lives lost in a world of such turmoil, especially when it relates to politics. The slabs of concrete representing the seats of the plane show two different views. To the higher-ups that causes the deaths, they may see the slabs as casualties. However, to most people not in power, each slab represents a real person with a family and a story that was cut very short when something out of their control was decided upon and resulted in their death. Seeing the amount of seats is shocking and strikes an emotional cord. Anyone who travels commercially on a plane hopes to safely land at their destination, but for these flights, it was not the case.
Walking into the exhibit, I personally had no knowledge of the events surrounding either of the two flights. Even so, when I saw each slab of concrete on the ground creating the seats of an airplane, I was physically stunned. I immediately knew this was about lives lost and that struck a cord with me. My parents travel a lot on planes and this is a constant worry in the back of my mind. Being so closely knit, we communicate constantly and are sure to get in touch as soon as we land and seeing this exhibit reminded me of our mortality. I personally would be devastated if my parents did not safely land after a flight. This exhibition exposed the truth of political wars conducted by people who have no connection to the people they murder.
Yazmin's Blog 