FOUR WALLS.

With poetry and photography in symbiosis, Andikan and Oscar Stokes have produced a collective piece which delves into a discussion about isolation and anti-social behaviour. The piece is a segment of a larger project titled "Satwa" where he aims to show 'the other side' of Dubai through photographing other creatives in a way that expresses their personal stories. The poem considers a possible motivator for anti-social behaviour in providing an apparent "comfort and security", but then suggests that the idea of isolation for the purposes of security is in actuality a mask on a life of monotony and dullness as a result of shutting oneself out from prospective life experiences. Coupled with the poem, Andikan introduces photographs which depict what seems to be a troubled youth. The subject stares intensely into the lens with dark, gloomy and uninviting eyes. The dull brown tones in the frame encapsulate a life void of excitement and the subject's choice of wardrobe compliments this theme. The elements of the photographs work together to give a sense of the subject's guarded and exclusive personality; the chain around his neck however, subtly alludes to a question of whether or not the subject, in an effort to guard himself against the world, has become a prisoner in his isolation.

Enjoy the piece below:

Four walls

I find myself instantly enclosed.

Enclosed in a space.

A space so well known for its comfort and security.

Four walls

Four walls that define our literal antisocial barrier

Four walls that we spend hours, eyes shut, gazing endlessly into the back of our ever so bleakly dull eyelids.

The very four walls that we endlessly breathe in the same breathed air over and over.

What are these four walls?

For if it was the brain, what is the comfort and security?

For if it was our heart, where does the love lie between these four walls?

And if these so very confusing walls were a room.

Where is the boy that was once so full of life?

Photography by Andikan (@andikan_ )

Model: Oscar Stokes
Poetry: Oscar Stokes