Portrait Of Her
A Portrait of Her investigates the ontology of the image by asking: what becomes of a photograph when the moment was never photographed? Shaped by the death of the artist’s mother, the installation brings together thirty-six etched brass plates. It is the ninth year without her, and this work becomes the closest gesture toward keeping her alive.
Each plate marks a year of her mother’s life and is etched with memories shared between mother and daughter. Together, they form “mental photographs”—a layered portrait where text holds presence, memory, and absence, allowing the artist to carry her mother’s life forward.
The plates reference a Rajasthani tradition in which married women receive engraved thalis. Denied this rite due to caste-based exclusion, the plates function as reparative objects and sites of cultural memory. Through inscription, language becomes an image-maker, prompting ephemeral, reader-specific visualizations that exist only in the mind.
Laser etching on brass plates
