In The Loving Memory Of

Reimagining the vanitas tradition through a contemporary, autobiographical lens, this body of work examines lineage, grief, and memory as lived and embodied experiences rather than symbolic abstractions. Historically, vanitas still lifes reflected on mortality through allegorical objects, reminding viewers of life’s transience. This project extends that lineage inward, grounding impermanence in personal inheritance and familial loss.

The materials used are inseparable from the narratives they carry. Fraying threads from my grandmother’s saree, handwritten letters by my mother, and lumen prints activated by my own tears function as both image and evidence—indexical traces of relationships that persist beyond physical absence. These elements resist permanence; they stain, fade, decay, and transform over time, mirroring the instability of memory and the gradual erosion of emotional certainty. Organic processes of decay are not concealed but embraced, allowing time itself to become a collaborator in the work.

Rather than commemorating loss through preservation alone, the series acknowledges grief as an ongoing, unfinished state—one that oscillates between tenderness and rupture. The domestic and intimate nature of the objects situates mourning within everyday life, where memory is carried through touch, scent, texture, and repetition. In doing so, the work proposes grief as a form of inheritance, passed quietly across generations through objects, gestures, and silence.

By merging historical references with deeply personal materials, the project reframes vanitas as a site of emotional continuity. While life remains fragile and impermanent, the work insists that the emotional imprints of those we lose persist—imperfect, vulnerable, and alive within the material world.