A scanned receipt from Syrian borders when fleeing war and leaving Syria. Here you can see the focus on the blue hue found in the stamps and signatures.

Dictatorship Blue, 2023-ongoing

The project began as a personal exploration of my legal documents and grew into a study of a particular colour I call Dictatorship Blue. This hue was traced from stamps and signatures found in papers issued by the Syrian government during the Assad regime. It became a way to examine how power operates through bureaucracy and documentation.

Dictatorship Blue originates from the marks of control that structure daily life under authoritarian rule. The colour embodies both personal memory and state power, turning the visual language of documents into a reflection on surveillance, obedience, and control.

My research extends beyond the Syrian context to question bureaucratic systems more broadly. The recurring use of blue in stamps and signatures reveals how administrative processes can enact violence quietly, through regulation and exclusion.

This investigation also follows my journey across Europe, where borders and papers defined access to safety. The repetition of bureaucratic control across different regimes shows how documentation itself can produce inequality.

By connecting the colour blue to these experiences, the project transforms into a critique of bureaucracy as a global structure of power, examining how paper, ink, and colour shape the lives of those forced to depend on them.