Benera and Estefan

Isa, por ës homou vogymuk (We are all dust and ashes), 2017 - ongoing
carved wood (180 x 15 x 15 cm), drawings on paper, black HDF

Kopjafa is a totemic wood sculpture used by Hungarian-speaking communities in Trasylvania as part of thier funerary rites. Each segment represents a distinctive biographic feature of a person, such as their gender or social status.

In reaction to current Hungarian nationalist propaganda uses of this symbolic object, Anca Benera and Arnold Estefan worked with a local craftsman to create new geometrical motifs symbolizing socially-discriminated groups including migrants, LGBTQ, homeless people or cultural workers.


                                                              

NyergestetÅ‘ is located in the southern part of the Csík Basin southeast on Transylvania (Romania)
at 875 m above sea level. The most famous memorial pillar of the Csíki Mountains, memory of one of the
last battles of the 1848-49 Hungarian Revolution and the War of Independence, is a perennial symbol of patriotism.
The nearby forest is not only the cemetery of the fallen soldiers from the 1849s, but also
the final resting place of the victims of the Turkish-Tatar invasions in 1550 and 1660.