“For Your Eyes Only” Multimedia Installation by Yasmine Nasser Diaz
Yasmine Nasser Diaz is an artist based in Los Angeles, and the 2021 Efroymson Emerging Artist at U-M’s Institute for the Humanities. She began her series of bedroom installations in 2018, “For Your Eyes Only” being the fourth iteration. The three previous installations were designed to be immersive and interactive: viewers were encouraged to come in, touch and smell things, and play music on cassette tapes. However, to maintain safety during the COVID-19 pandemic, this one had to be designed differently. Diaz incorporated this into the concept of “For Your Eyes Only,” making the viewing experience one that was solely visual.
When the reality of the pandemic began to set in, Yasmine Nasser Diaz saw her friends struggle. One friend in particular loved to dance, and the two would go dancing together. However, she has a serious health issue that puts her at higher risk for a serious case of COVID-19, and she wasn’t able to go out. Diaz saw how difficult this new reality was for her friend, so she began recording videos of herself dancing and sending them to her friend, including the message “for your eyes only.” What started as a fun way to brighten someone’s day became the concept that inspired her installation: the lines of public and private life becoming increasingly blurred.
“It reminds me of how we use social media,” Diaz says, “especially in the ways that we share and receive information that is quite intimate.” We view this intimate content from our screens: as outsiders looking in. Once content is out there, we no longer have control over the way it is interpreted or perceived by others. Diaz’s installation parallels this voyeuristic experience, intentionally prompting viewers to question whether or not they belong in the bedroom space. Bedrooms are inherently intimate, “your room is your space, it’s your sanctuary, it’s your refuge,” says Diaz. When you allow someone into your room, you reveal a private part of yourself. “I can still very much remember that feeling of being a teenager and entering into someone’s bedroom. It’s such a privilege.” In a similar way, social media has blurred the boundaries between private and public life, providing a window into people’s private lives that may otherwise have never been publicly revealed.
Social media has also served as a form of connection for Diaz. She grew up in Chicago, but her parents immigrated from Yemen. Her beliefs are much more liberal than those of the Yemeni community, and she often felt isolated. “The values of the society that I was growing up in were much different than where my family came from,” Diaz reflects. “I think connecting with people on social media would have been helpful because I felt very alone.” The latest bedroom installation includes a compilation of Instagram and TikTok videos projected onto pink, patterned wallpaper. All the people in the clips are of SWANA (Southwest Asian/ North African) descent, some of them personal friends of Diaz. Most of them are dancing in their bedrooms.
“These seemingly casual videos of people dancing may not seem like much, but for many of us—especially of SWANA backgrounds—it’s really powerful,” says Diaz. She describes the experience of women in the SWANA region or in SWANA communities to be a very gendered one. Women do not have the same freedoms that men do. They face oppressive treatment in education, work force participation, and family roles.
“In some ways, their casualness makes them more powerful, because it speaks to how at ease that person is in their body/their space. It is a demonstration of asserting autonomy over your own body.”
Having personal relationships with many of the individuals in the clips, Diaz acknowledges that it took a while for many of them to get to a place of freedom where they felt comfortable sharing a video of themselves dancing. Diaz incorporates a variety of different styles of dance into the video compilation.
Protests also frequently involve singing and dancing, whether it is planned or not. In particular, Diaz points to a protest against sexual violence in Turkey. “These are protests about very serious things, but people coming together in support of one another creates a celebratory mood that happens naturally. It’s a really beautiful thing.” Seeing someone dance in an uninhibited way is a liberating experience, she says. You don’t need words to understand expression through song or dance…you see it and you feel it.
A TV set plays footage from women-led movements in the SWANA region protesting unjust gender-based laws or treatment in society. The footage includes speeches, documentaries, and marches. The TV reel culminates in chant protest that has an element of dance. At this point, the reel merges with the Instagram and TikTok compilation, and women come together in song and dance: a celebration.
Diaz describes the connection between physical protesting and protesting through social media: “There are real conversations happening between homelands and diasporas. We are connected in a way we never have been before, and protests that might have only happened in one place now have domino effects. They spread like wildfire, they happen all over the world.”
Both these forms of protest present real risks, whether people are physically putting their bodies on the streets for a protest, or sharing their personal views online. Stepping into the public advocacy sphere, especially with the rapid sharing of information today, puts these individuals at risk.
“I’m grateful to the people who take those kinds of risks. So many of us benefit from the freedoms that have come about because of the people who put themselves on the line in a very public way.”
