TOWER MIGRATION
This series originated in my interest in, and consequent research into the biblical story of the Tower of Babel. Throughout my subsequent research, this story represented a greater way to understand human ambition/desire and how people overcome adversity. I found parallel cautionary tales in multiple myths and belief systems that address our human yearning to move towards something. From an anthropological perspective, I was interested in the motivations behind human migration. At first, I wanted to answer the question “what are people moving towards?” And realized that perhaps this question is better stated as: “what circumstance are people moving away from?”
Photo by Kenji Ma
The TOWER MIGRATION series started with this piece. It was in reaction to work I was doing with recently arrived Syrians to Canada. To communicate with them in Arabic, I started using Google translate. This reminded me of the story of the Tower of Babel. I recognized that technology has given humans the opportunity to transcend language barriers and build a global world. From this point, I started questioning what the globalized world is moving towards.
Google Tower
Mixed media on paper
56” X 33”
2017
The creation of this piece derived from my research into the origins of humans. Understanding that before my lifetime, learning human migration depended on archeology. Now, within the past two decades, we understand human origins better than ever before.
DNA
Mixed media on paper mounted on wood
80” X 40”
2020
This work marked a turning point in the project when my research into global human movement had me recognize that most movement is forced by some form of tragedy. This overlapped with other research I was doing in greek mythology. One of the greek muses, Melpomene, is one of the core learnings. I saw that tragedy has always been part of be human and so I started to explore my own representations of tragedy and created various characters.
Melpomene
Mixed media on wood
36” X 48”
2018
This work had me returning to an examination of what humans are moving towards and why. Through my surveys, I discovered most of us make choices based on the possibility of financial prosperity. When questioning deeper, I saw that this was largely for material wealth. I realized that this ambition is a relatively recent desire by humans dating back to the industrial revolution where it was hugely contemplated by philosophers, governments, and the church. The book Fable of the Bees gave me insight to this history and helped shape some of the imagery.
Fable of the Bees
Mixed media on paper mounted on wood
80” X 40”
2019
After having researched first hand accounts of migration, I thought to do a biographical portrait of migration. Who better than my own life partner, who spent the first part of her life on the southern tip of North America and the later part in the north. She helped me to understand the feelings of belonging in relation to geography and time.
Past, present, and future
Charcoal and oil on wood
24” X 24”
2018
I wanted to come full circle with the project in this piece by concluding with the philosophy of interculturalism. Through the usage of collaged images from around the world, I created a utopian tower with representations of the whole world co-existing while still having their respective identities.
Cultivating Humanity
Mixed media on wood
55”X50”
2022