On The Ineffable

The Thorn and The Banana Leaf

"Transience" 

Documentation of ephemeral work

Archival pigment prints 14" x 12" and 24" x 10'

Hand cut banana leaves which then decayed in the su

Potentially Empty

Media: Stop-motion photography and video performance with ambient and collected sound, 2015.

Sunyata is the Buddhist concept of “emptiness”. Most often it is confused with the void or non-existence of matter. Sunyata actually addresses interconnectivity and eternity in Buddhist philosophy. His holiness the Dalai Lama refers to Sunyata as “the knowledge of the ultimate reality of all objects, material and phenomenal”. This concept acknowledges that the present state of all things is a result of its previous state and can be traced back to eternity. There is no beginning or end. Our time on earth is a brief interlude in a continuum. This artwork is my own search for meaning within this transience using a limited vocabulary such as the “vessel” and the perceptive hand.

Touch

Photopolymer intaglio print, graphite drawing

Using simplicity of form and minimal number of materials, I explore the ephemeral in this series. Transience and elusive meaning are given form in the graphite lines that are visible and invisible depending on the light and the angle of the viewer. The visceral nature of touch and the potential of what our skin can feel and understand is distilled in this work. How can one represent the cool breeze on a warm summer evening or the silkiness of a flower petal on your cheek?  What about the moments that take our breath away and we are grasping for words before the thought disappears forever? How does one address the ineffable? This is an ongoing series that explores these concepts.

The Never Ending Line I and II and III

Ephemeral threshold drawings have been made by women for hundreds of years in various parts of India. They are called rangoli, kolam, muggu, alpana etc. depending on the region. These ritual drawings can be highly mathematical, symmetric and intricate. I chose to visualize mitochondrial DNA, a significant part of the human genome that is solely inherited from the mother. Mitochondria generates the energy driving all life and has been transmitted for millions of years exclusively through women. Handed down over generations of women, purely through observation and expansion, the making of these drawings has survived immense changes in culture and location. I borrow this form to talk about how one can find a continuum within change and recognize the value of an embodied knowledge handed down through our lineage. The two sand drawings on black canvas are 5’ X5’ placed on a platform off the floor.

The Never Ending Line III: (Video projection and mirror)

A kolam consists of a grid of dots around which a single line is drawn. The line starts at one end, loops around the dots sinuously and connects back to the starting point after innumerable turns and bends. These patterns are often challenging and confusing and require great concentration. Patterns are handed down from one generation to the other. They signify unity and harmony in all of creation. In this work, I used a video recording of a woman making a kolam but edited it in a way that suggests a never ending line- a continuum that is cyclical and inherent both in the looping line and the looping video. The mathematical complexity that is present in the process and the feeling of disorientation in a field of dots and lines is enhanced by the multiplication through mirroring. I remember making these with my grandmother and getting lost and disoriented- much like who I feel sometimes in a new place.