Studies on Smiling II (Black Odonata), 2019

Studies on Smiling explores the politics of the smile, especially as performed by first-generation migrant women in the Asian diaspora working in the retail and service industries. The project is inspired by the autobiography of my aunt, who migrated from South Korea to West Germany at the age of 26 in the 1980s and spent her whole life working at a small kiosk. The smile acts as a kinetic form of resistance that goes beyond the means of spoken or written language.

 
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Photography: Julia Pfister-Mischkowski