Zoha Ahsaan-ali

Fine Art

I am interested in ways that identity, language and culture intercept and affect each other, using text and ideas of the domestic space to explore these concepts.

Final Project

Ghar ki Baat;

‘Home Talk’

Digital image

My work responds to postcolonial discourse, especially the concept of the diasporic figure and ‘third space’, the place where cultural meaning is assigned its value. The role of language in my work is to become a vessel for this ‘third space’, using a pseudo-code to translate text into a script that visually mimics Urdu and Arabic’s Persian script. I also use the imagery of hands in particular as a bridge between the calligraphic work and the body, to emphasise the cultivation of cultural practices as an act of care.

‘Spoken Home’

Ink on paper

I explore concepts of language and home in my work. I view language as part of what molds personal identity, in the same way that you pick up words and phrases through talking to others, you identify yourself through your relation to or distance from others. These things congregate to form one’s identity and the home serves as a site for transforming these ideas into physicality- the form of the words becoming the walls.