I confront themes around ‘home’ and the reconstruction of this idea throughout my own practice. This piece marks the first work in my series which looks toward my ancestors’ indentured journey into South Africa- and essentially mark the start of my journey toward finding “home’ while contending with my own cultural identity as a 5th generation Indian female living in South Africa, and more especially how it impacts my art practice. I have been fascinated by my exposure to the unrelenting divergence of identity and expectation. I soon learnt that what starts out as a vision soon becomes corrupted into a dialect of futility, self-hate, judgement and resurfacing discriminations – leaving only a sense of chaos and the unlikelihood of a new beginning AND the Dawn of a New Understanding.
As subtle forms become reconfigured through emergent and repetitive practice in my work, the viewer is left with an epitaph for my own expressive thoughts, stories and experiences. This piece takes me on my own journey of transcending thresholds.
I look at Butler’s (2009) paper where it is stated that through particular narratives, we must develop a paradigm of thinking about the ways in which we can express or represent the pain of someone else and begin to engage with perspectives that are normative so that we are able to emphasise the difference in acknowledging various subjects. Through these critical inquiries of race, gender, narratives and geographies: I contend with my own identity and take on the role in playing a witness as how this unfolds in my own artistic practice. This piece looks to unfold my own art practice which largely looks toward the medium of narratives and storytelling in my art in order to focus on internal aspects of my own history: Which in essence, being that of an Indian female, resident in South Africa, and in turn, I aim to acknowledge what my history means when looking at identity formation, deformation and reformation through the recognition of the colonial powers that are and were in the works – both in the past and now in current days- as well as the journey I take throughout my work as its own process toward decolonial healing.
Transcending Thresholds
2022
Installation