Mara Ahmed

Mara Ahmed
Long Island, New York, USA

STATEMENT

The urge to unsettle borders and decolonize given narratives is a thread that runs through most of my art practice. Collage has always been my preferred method of assembling diverse images, textures, stories, and lifeworlds. The three collages shown here are part of a multimedia project that questions the role of photography, its ties to Western imperialism, and the use of women of color to produce figures of a phantasm. This series, Return to Sender: Women of Color in Colonial Postcards & the Politics of Representation, includes photographic stills which recreate Orientalist postcards dating back to the early 1900s, as well as fabric-based collages that celebrate South Asian architecture, textiles, and peoples.

BIO

Best known for her non-linear interdisciplinary work, Mara Ahmed produces documentaries, soundscapes, and artwork that challenge political borders and colonial logics. Mara was born in Lahore and educated in Belgium, Pakistan, and the US. Her collage work has been exhibited coast-to-coast in the United States, most recently at the Huntington Historical Society in New York. Mara has directed and produced four films, including Return to Sender: Women of Color in Colonial Postcards & the Politics of Representation, a multimedia project for which she was awarded a NYSCA grant in 2023. She is currently working on The Injured Body, a documentary about racism in America that focuses on the voices of women of color.

ARTIST CONTACT

[click to email]
www.maraahmedstudio.com

IMAGES