2003, Showcase, video installation, 17’39’’
Developed within the frame of the project “Where? Here?”
The Museum of Modern Art, Saitama, Japan
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Stereotype figures of identification, such as those that the Japanese media offer to young girls are the theme that the artist addresses in the work Which one you chose?. Japanese fashion magazines work with two young girls in each of their issues, whereby one always plays the cool girl and the other the “sweet girl”, two roles from Japanese comic culture. They are accompanied through one month, during which they receive clothes and keep a journal. The concept is so consistent and widespread that it seems as though there is no room for alternatives alongside these two characters. During Esra Ersen’s stay in Tokyo, she met different groups of girls and a fashion critic, who talked about this phenomenon and their culture. The work involves understanding what it means to identify with stereotype or unreal characters like the Mangas, and which functions these kinds of role models could have in a society.