Foreclosure is a filmic documentation of a performance conceived in response to an escalating global political crisis and presented on December 13 in the artist’s studio, shortly before the intensification of war involving the United States, Israel, and Iran.

Drawing on psychoanalytic theory, the work centers on the concept of Verwerfung (foreclosure), introduced by Sigmund Freud and later developed by Jacques Lacan as the forclusion du Nom-du-Père. Unlike repression, foreclosure designates what is never symbolized and therefore returns in the real as delusion or hallucination. This structure—marked not by cognitive disintegration but by affective rigidity and disturbing clarity—forms the core of the performance.

Through a deeply personal narrative, I trace this mechanism in the figure of my father, who had been a passionate Nazi, whose denial of reality manifested in extreme ideological and misogynistic positions. His refusal to acknowledge an extramarital affair—recasting the woman as a fictive “comrade”—becomes a lived example of foreclosure in action.

Extending beyond the personal, Foreclosure draws parallels to contemporary political dynamics, where denied realities are replaced by delusional certainties. Figures such as Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin, and Mohammed bin Salman embody this logic, illustrating how foreclosure at the level of power can culminate in violence and war.

The project also incorporates responses from Hannah and Vadim, two Ukrainian refugees invited to develop their own performances on the theme of war, expanding the work into a collective reflection on trauma, denial, and geopolitical conflict.

Foreclosure ultimately interrogates the psychic structures that underpin both intimate and global forms of violence, revealing how what is excluded from symbolization returns with destructive force.