Abstract
I investigate how immigrants use creativity and making to establish home and express their identity. This is explored through the interplay between natural and urban environments, focusing on the conflicts and connections between them. My research investigates how language and creative practices, particularly printmaking, textile dyeing, and photography, can foster a sense of belonging in urban settings, especially as a non-native English speaker. Rooted in my lived experience of feeling othered by people yet embraced by nature, my work reflects on identity, history, culture, and tradition. In 1973 my family moved from southern Sweden to the outer northeast archipelago of the Åland Islands, Finland to the remote island community of Brändö. My mum joined the Martaföreningen (the Women’s Society) where they were weaving rag rugs as per tradition in Finland. She had no creative education but approached weaving in her own way, working with colours and patterns in a non-traditional manner. Old methods in combination with new thinking around creativity, highly unusual in the isolated community. One of the rugs my mum made now lives with me in East London and forms a constant reminder of the importance of making and the power of colour as resilience. Working with natural pigments sourced from local and past environments, I weave together personal and collective narratives to express the layered complexities of belonging and placemaking. This research translates the immigrant experience through the shared languages of visual narratives, material outcomes and tactility.
Details
Presentation Type
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Theme
The Arts in Social, Political, and Community Life
KEYWORDS
Place making, Immigration, Art, Design, Sense of Place, Craft, Non-craft
