Selected Works — Kamila Tasimenova

Selected Works
I WILL EAT WELL
Immersive installation, Fabric, yarn, cardboard, found objects, 130 cm x 120 cm

“I will eat well” is a formal phrase in Korean, said to appreciate a provided meal. In other contexts and languages it could be murmured to oneself in reassurance. It can be a response to a loved one insisting you eat properly. It can be giddy excitement. As locations shift, so do ingredients, utensils, and habits. Recipes once shared with family become improvised, reduced, eaten beside a screen.

The installation places the viewer inside a reconfigured dining table, aligned at eye level. Around, abstract dishes made from fabric and found materials reference familiar meals, pointing to gestures of care, routine, and memory. Food operates as a marker of belonging and how its rituals change when one relocates. Between here and elsewhere, eating well becomes less about replication and more about adaptation, carrying fragments of home into new conditions, and learning how to share them again.

IF HE BEATS YOU, HE LOVES YOU [B’ET ZNACHIT LUBIT]

A memory emerged in light of my contemplation about the theme 'female experience'. Russian girls, me included, are raised on the understanding that if a boy picks on them, bullies them, pulls their hair - he likes them. I myself heard the phrase "b'et znachit lubyt" which translates to "if he beats you, he loves you" countless times. Unfortunately, this 'understanding' often bleeds into adulthood, more than 12,000 women were killed from 2011 to 2019 by their partners or family members, according to the Russian Consortium of Women's NGO's. The work is a commentary on the decriminalization of domestic abuse in Russia in 2017, a culture in which the phrase "b'et znachit lubit", translating to "if he beats you, he loves you", is engraved in people's minds, either as a humorous proverb or an accepted truth. The carpet references the traditional Persian rugs, popular during the times of the Soviet Union to insulate homes, over time becoming a staple to every household, not only for practical purposes but as a status symbol. The woman atop is yet another victim of the culture that enables 'looking the other way'.

SUN&MOON

HOFSTEDE’S MASK

MISCL.