mayrig, mother
2023, hand-dyed textile with madder roots and woad, 
embroidery thread, 200x140 cm

In this embroidery work I was inspired by the Armenian painter Arshile Gorky, who survived the deportations and genocide and went to North America. Carrying a picture of him and his mom before the WWI, he worked for around 10 years on the painting The artist and his mother to recall his memories, and the trauma of loosing his mom as a child. Juxtaposing this story with my family; my father who also lost his mother at an early age and me as a second generation to his loss, I drew and embroidered two mothers who look very much alike – with the wishful thinking of bridging mothers of the same territory. I worked with the sketches of Gorky and old photos of my grandmother, whom I never met.