Create Your First Project
Start adding your projects to your portfolio. Click on "Manage Projects" to get started
Are Forgotten Memories Still Happy?
Materials
Canvas, Acrylic Paint, Medium, Embroidery Thread, Synthetic Thread
Date
2022
Location
Royal College of Art, London, UK
The philosophical question that inspired this piece is; “If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, did it make a sound?”
If a happy memory is lost to Alzheimer’s, is it still happy?
I painted this to unpack the experience of watching my mother lose her parents to Alzheimer’s. My mother’s favorite colors symbolize the happy childhood memories that are being forgotten by her parents. Foggy yet warm, these colors are the backdrop for the stitched neurons that drip off the canvas, obscuring the paint underneath and falling all the way to the ground.
The layers of matte paint and layers of yarn represent the memories being muffled by tau protein tangles and beta amyloid plaques - two causes for Alzheimer’s.
Hoping forgotten memories can remain beautiful and happy, I’ve reframed Alzhei- mer’s into soft fading. For the first time, turned to painting instead of science for understanding and comfort.
A gentle fading of stitched neurons into the painted back- ground. A slow disappearing of facts. A blurring of childhood memories, and dripping off the canvas onto the ground.
