21″x17″; digital collage constructed with scanned South Asian fabric and photographs printed on fine art giclée paper, 2023. Courtesy of the artist.
FILM SCREENING AT KOLAJ FEST NEW ORLEANS 2024
Return to Sender: Women of Color in Colonial Postcards & the Politics of Representation
Thursday, 13 June 2024, 3:15-4:15PM
New Orleans Museum of Art
Mara Ahmed
EVENT WEBSITE | REGISTER
Kolaj Fest New Orleans is a multi-day festival and symposium about contemporary collage and its role in art, culture, and society, 12-16 June 2024. Visit the website to learn more, see an overview of the program, and register to attend.
“Return to Sender: Women of Color in Colonial Postcards & the Politics of Representation is a short, experimental film directed and produced by Mara Ahmed. It pushes the documentary medium in unexpected ways by opening with three contemporary South Asian-American women who recreate British colonial postcards from the early 20th century. Dressed in lavish traditional attire and jewelry and shot exquisitely in a darkened studio, the women emulate the awkward poses of the postcard women, only to subvert the colonial male gaze and acquire autonomy by choosing an action of their own. This symbolic ‘returning’ of the Orientalist gaze is layered with discussions about Eurocentric beauty standards, representations of South Asian women in media and culture, stereotypes, othering, identity and belonging. The film hopes to create community by facilitating conversations about erasure and the politics of representation.”
The film invites artists to consider the materials they choose; where they come from; and how they operate in the culture. Ahmed will introduce the film and speak about her experience making it. She will speak about the male gaze, colonial representations of the “other,” Orientalism, and ways of questioning Eurocentric knowledge and offer a critical analysis of Orientalist postcards that encourages us to view them through an alternative lens.
12″x15″; giclée print; 2019. Courtesy of the artist.
ARTIST BIO
Mara Ahmed was educated in Belgium, Pakistan and the United States and holds an MBA and a Master’s in Economics, with studies in art at Nazareth College and film at the Visual Studies Workshop and the Rochester Institute of Technology. She produces documentaries, soundscapes, and artwork that challenge borders and colonial logics. Her films have been broadcast on PBS and screened at international film festivals. Her 2015 film, A Thin Wall, won a special jury prize at the 2018 Amsterdam Film Festival. Return to Sender received a 2023 New York State Council on the Arts Film Grant and was showcased along with its companion art exhibition (including photography and collage work in conversation with the film) at the Huntington (New York) Historical Society’s History and Decorative Arts Museum. The artist lives and works on Long Island, New York. Learn more at maraahmedstudio.com.
Kolaj Fest New Orleans is a multi-day festival and symposium about contemporary collage and its role in art, culture, and society, 12-16 June 2024. Visit the website to learn more, see an overview of the program, and register to attend.