'The possessed is quite capable of remembering the Terrible Spectacle.' (Oesterreich, 1966, p. 40)

The word maskh in Farsi connotes more than metamorphosis; it delineates the limits of one's identity or existence as marked by new vehicles of material and abstract articulation. Examples include spirit possession in which the demon demarcates the limits of identity, or living in an entirely different culture where the limits of one's identity are put to the test.

The Maskh Project has been abstractly created after the forgotten art of Talisman-forging in the Middle East particularly Iran. Middle Eastern talismans are forged in the form of diagrammatic bodies whose true figurative ideas are stripped down to their minimal abstract components -- numbers as body parts, letter curvatures as fiendish fauna, geometric elements as skeletal frames and alpha-numeric convolutions or miniature ciphers as elementary particles of the world surrounding the figures. Each talisman or spell-diagram casts a particular spell and by doing so effectuates a metamorphosis or possession. Middle Eastern talismans present the idea of metamorphosis through the realm of in-between, between the figurative and its numero-diagrammatic double. These talismans are therefore the ideal vehicles for diagramming my metamorphoses following my move from the United States to the Middle East, not in a narrative manner but in a cartographic way. In the tradition of spell and grimoire writing in the Middle East, Maskh Project is constituted of spells, diagrams and visual studies of metamorphosis. Each Maskh drawing represents a particular spell or map for metamorphosis, an event which leads to a certain alteration. The project medium is ink drawing on paper using Persian ink (made of gum Arabic, soot, alum, tannic acid and water) and Persian calligraphic pen (made of bamboo), the ultimate instrument for creating curving monstrosities. The first episode of Maskh drawings was published as series of drawings and text entitled 'Maskh' in Frozen Tears 3, a global anthology of theory, art and writing edited by John Russell Article Press, 2007). Working with similar materials, the current installment of Maskh includes 100 drawings [see clickable images below].