The product of artistic research, montage, and reproduction processes, Michaela Melián’s works involve a complex, transmedia layering of image, sound, and text. Red Threads, which is published in conjunction with the identically titled survey exhibition on Melián at the KINDL – Centre for Contemporary Art in Berlin, focuses on Tamara Bunke and follows the trajectory of her life as it switches between the GDR and South America. Starting from the guerrillera who went under the nom de guerre Tania, a network of 'red threads' unfolds, leitmotifs that cover a wide range of themes that include canonisation, the Neues Wohnen movement, political theatre, gender norms, and a sense of home. Melián’s drawings, stamps, overlays, sewn pieces, weavings, and musical compositions provide unexpected contextualisation for themes that are politically and socially volatile.
148 pages, 16 x 23 cm, softcover, Spector Books (Leipzig).