In the series A Sense of Place I am using maps that belonged to my father. Coming from a migrant family he had to define himself in a place with a different cultural background. I felt I inherited his search to find oneself within one’s local surroundings. To define this heritage I am using the imagery from the body and the blood circulation in connection with maps. The word circulation holds a meaning of physical displacement that could be directly connected with the use of maps. These ones are underlining the notion of spatial identification. The maps are cut, painted or left intact. The body is the recipient of this search and also defines the first place we inhabit.

In the Belonging Series, I am exploring the concept of identity and mobility. For this work, I use phone books pages from countries I lived in, as they are the carrier of individual and collective traces. These intricate and detailed collages take the form of cultural references specific to the country from which the phonebooks were taken (e.g. a quilt as representative of America, aboriginal art for Australia, mosaic for Italy, lace making for Switzerland, circle for Singapore). The collages are the witnesses of my migrating life and the interactive relationship existing between individuals, places and memory.

My Indian residency inspired the Jaali Series. The work is done with gouache, pencil and bindi dots. The paint is applied with a very thin brush that is used for miniature paintings in Rajasthan. Jaali is a term used for the perforated stone with an ornamental pattern that can be seen in palaces, forts and some residencies in Rajasthan. Often used as screen, women could look outside their world without being seen. The Jaali series emerges as a reflection on the way we look “outside” and how the “inside” is perceived. The bindi dot was added to introduce the notion of person, its social status and its place in society.

Brick Work is a series done with paper collected from the pavement of New York city. Each one of these lost, rejected, neglected paper holds a mark of our historical time (as for example the election) and a specificity of a place through elements of language and theme. Using the idea of brickwork I built an image that speaks about NYC, its particularities and structure.