Description

Provenance is my newest print and textile series that features my liminal figure rendered in silhouette with my ancestral home positioned as the head. This 19th century house structure is a replication of my maternal family home in Grenada, West Indies. The house having survived both man-made and natural disasters explores the lineage of resilience and preservation, while the figure illustrates the reclamation of one’s land, home, and self. By manipulating the surface of the polyester prints using mixed media techniques of collage, beading, and embroidery I explore concepts of past and present-day colonialism, and notions of provenance as it relates to origin, authorship, and ownership. This special edition print and textile series is a personal examination into notions of selfhood. Contemplating both the interior and exterior spaces of my black womanhood. What does it mean to embody a place or have the ability to locate oneself in a space? How do I create imagery that is not based on mimicry or in relation to others but rather iconography that moves my black female body beyond servitude, violence, trauma, and exploitation to one that exudes my beauty, and complexity?

Photo by Yao Zu Lu