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Hybrid domesticities

expat harem series widget smallBy ROSE DENIZ

Moving in my late 20s to Turkey was not a blithe casting-off of my upbringing in a Wisconsin farming community. Long hours reading. Marching through cattails. Years hoarding art supplies in humble Midwestern cities. An MFA in painting from Cranbook Academy of Art.

Choosing an industrial town outside Istanbul was an abandonment, though, of the idea that an emerging artist needs to move to New York. I wouldn’t be courting galleries, getting work into the flat file at Pierogi, or showing at Artists Space. The binary self by Rose Deniz

I left behind a studio practice dedicated to 40 hours a week of art, and coffee table art books. My paintings were too large to transport, so I brought pens and ink. Disengaged from the white cube of the gallery, I planned to be a practicing artist in Turkey — while crafting a new home.

I married, had two children, and set up a home studio. Art spaces in Istanbul like Galerist and art fairs like Contemporary Istanbul struck me with their resemblance to icy New York venues, distanced from the itinerant, the raw, and female artists with children. Despite how modern we assume contemporary art is, it’s still ideal to be male and unattached.

My academic advisor once told me, “You can be an artist or a mother, but you can’t be both.”  Nevertheless, I am drawn to textiles, craft, and interior spaces; three things associated with female artists, or better yet, housewives.

Moving abroad has encouraged me to navigate the interlocking realms of the domestic and artistic.

It seems I’ve entered Gloria Anzaldua’s non-binary state of “borderlands” where identities conflict and mesh. Meanwhile my nesting instinct evokes the new domesticity, a feminist return to the cult of womancraft.

How does the expatriate engage the new domesticity while retaining her identity as a professional?

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Rose Deniz is knee-high in quilting fabric, writing a fictional handbook of domestic impulses, and sharing drawings of daily life on her blog.
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November 4th, 2009 | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Category: borderlands, career, community, family, home, identity
  • rosedeniz
    Everyone, thank you so much for your comments!

    Alice, isn't Turkey a wonderful place to be initiated into the handcrafted? I agree with you that Etsy.com is a great resource for budding or established crafters and artists.

    Catherine, you are speaking my language as a mother, and Nassim, even though I have some sort of domestic "making gene" as you say, it was thwarted for many years. Kudos to you for nurturing your book with the same devotion.

    Kari, it seems we never go back home the same. Think of all the wonderful things, including a new language, that you took back with you. I'm glad to hear expat+HAREM is a place of community for all of us.
  • Kari
    Merhabalar, and thank you Anastasia. Your words are as always very encouraging!:)I guess I always wished I could have found a site like for sharing thoughts during my decade when I was more or less 'rooted' in Turkey. There in the beginning, I was quite busy working in an international community. When 'daily life' set in after a few years living with my (ex)Turkish life partner at different places in Turkey, I found it most necessary to keep my own feeling of Norwegian identity, personal interests, goals etc alive, in order to lead a balanced life while integrating in the local society. It was challenging, very difficult at times I admit, but also life changing in an enriching way. These days I must also admit I often feel like an expat living here in my own culture.. as a result of the transitions I went through in a muslim culture. What kept me grounded in Turkey was the love of the language and Turkish literature, and the immense self-satisfaction of studying Turkish and thus getting to understand the 'soul' of the country more.:)Although hard at times this kind of 'academic' curiousity gave fuel to my wish to live in the beautiful Anatolian country. Last but not the least I was lucky to find some fantastic Turkish friends who are still part of my life. I hope I can continue to enjoy the best of both 'my worlds' for many years still to come. Hoşçakalın herkese. Gününüz güzel olsun! :)
  • Greetings Alice and Nassim!

    Kari, I think you are definitely "qualified" to make comments here even if your expatriatism has ended....especially since you say you can relate to these thoughts. That's all it takes, being able to relate to the issues! We're not only expats here, we are people who feel the tensions of all these different worlds inside as well as outside.

    Catherine, child-rearing and writing are both very difficult pursuits so I can imagine trying to do them both at once something's going to suffer -- if only your expectations.
  • Well, dear women, hats off to you to making beautiful things (paintings, baked goods, clothes, art, etc). The internet has given us a helping hand with professionalizing this creative domesticity, or at least making us feel less isolated when we do. I often wish I had that "making gene" that would compel me to create with my hands; I can't even be bothered to cook! Alas, I live in the realm of ideas and relationships. The closest I've arrived at making something has been writing a book. Even then, it has been a daily struggle with discipline to make paragraphs that create a whole new world. I have not managed to blog either, though I am a relatively consistent Tweeter (@nassefi) I'm very much enjoying this blog and can vouch for Etsy.com too.
  • Alice
    Hello from an expat living in Michigan. I've spent almost two years living in Turkey among my Turkish husband's family. It has been said that I am more Turkish than my husband, and to me, I would hope to retain this compliment.
    As a young girl, I've always watched my mother sew and crochet, cook and clean; and, never understood some friends who were unable to sew on a button. I greatly admired all the handiwork my mother could do (she was a French Canadian), but my artfulness grew in dance and being a Florist.
    Now, I've come to the conclusion, that when you really love something and silently suffer for the lack of it, it will show up a hundred fold if you let it. While in Turkey, my eyes had a feast of crochet and women who could do it superbly, I gained cousins that could show me their fine art of all handiwork, cooking and care of the home. Time was made for each chore, each lesson and each sharing of art. I was never bored, and still wish for more of those days. I closely learned from my new family the way of doing it all.
    There is a site on the internet: Etsy.com, where you can find work by artists/crafters and the like from all over the world. Hard to imagine all the talent that is added to everyday schedules of life.
  • Motherhood brings a large amount of self-sacrifice of personality with it, so leaving professionalism aside, our 'outside' interests may become our only self-expression during that period. Of course as the children grow it becomes easier but you may find you are more in need of your art during the early, hectic years.

    I never managed to do as much as I wanted with my writing during those years but perhaps my ambitions weren't realistic.

    Anastasia as the only mother who brings a homemade cake to birthdays in preschool I don't think crafting is the only thing that is suffering in modern Turkey. Just think of the explosion of packet soups in the last number of years, eight years ago it was difficult to see any at all in a supermarket.
  • Kari
    Hello from me in Norway. Thank you for such an interesting site. I follow you with great enthusiasm. The topics here are ever so culturally prevailing, whether living as an expat in Turkey or in most other countries, I guess. I suppose I am not qualified to make much comments here since I currently am not an expat, but I used to live in Turkey for years and the culture there has left a strong impact on me. Can certainly relate to all your thoughts here though. Turkey as a community is obviously changing, rapidly, and I am sure it will go through its own stages while developing. It is such a complex society, so diverse, as you well know. I commend you all on your inspiring work and am grateful for reading what you share. Hope to see you one day in Turkey!

    Kolay gelsin hepinize. :)
  • rosedeniz
    Thanks for having me, Anastasia! Yes, the pendulum swings - and I think that is where choice and innovation comes in; that you don't have to make everything by hand to be domestic nor be excluded from the canon of art if you choose to tend to domestic-artistic pursuits.

    I think there is a strong possibility that future generations of young urban women in Turkey will do less handcraft. Between a pursuit of the modern and economic factors that force them to have less free time, the division will be even more stark here if handcraft is only seen as being old fashioned.
  • rosedeniz
    Thanks for your thoughtful comments, Tara, and great questions there at the end. Yes, I think artists/mothers have strong tendencies toward innovation when fully mobilized.

    I wonder if the idea 'you can have it all, just not all at the same time' is actually a binary, linear thought? That maybe with a "new hybrid domesticity" it can happen at the same time but with a different set of personal and professional expectations? Hence the need to be a master of your own guidelines, like you suggest.
  • Thanks for being the first guest poster at expat+HAREM Rose! I'm looking forward to your series on art, nesting and expatriatism.

    Your post has me thinking about the craft-climate around us and how that affects our embrace of handwork, or not. I grew up crafty (not the most talented, but bit of a macrame queen). Never a store bought card or gift. Butter cookies from the bakery an obscene luxury. The pendulum always swings...there comes a time when you want the opposite thing. Something made by a machine, for instance, or that looks and works better than something you can make by hand. By high school this time came for me. Later when I moved to Southeast Asia the region was experiencing an economic boom, trading their beautiful hand-woven baskets for 'better' plastic ones at the pazars. Houses looked like kindergartens with all the primary colored plastic furniture! I definitely felt the squeeze between the local trends and my own taste. Here in Turkey there is still a strong tradition of handicraft and womancraft in particular, but it remains divided by socio-economic factors. I know a Turkish matron who pores over Martha Stewart magazines and then has the maid from the village make the wreath of rosebuds.
  • First of all - look at Martha Stewart who made being a homemaker a profession.

    Secondly, on the day I graduated from university, my psychology professor who also happened to be the department chair at the time, said to me: "You can have it all, you just can't have it all at the same time."

    Third, a quote on the wall above my computer: "Masters create their own guidelines."

    And lastly, isn't it artists who find innovative ways to reinterpret how we see life? Aren't mothers the ultimate artists and innovators trying to find ways to make it all work together?
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