as it seems, installation view at ArtLab Gallery, Western University, used denim, thread, galvanized wire, safety pins, 2019

in as it seems, denim material is constructed to bring attention to the tear, worn, faded, incomplete, and stretch of a body in a diaspora. A piece of clothing that cover, wrap, and confine the body can drag and stretch across space. Tearing and turning the material inside-out brings attention to the material’s history. This is a way to pay attention to the background —paying attention to the details that are often lost or ignored. The destruction, however, only refers to a history, which is akin to the immigration experience, unable to fully grasp a whole of familial histories, cultures, traditions, and language due to uprooting and regroundings. 

as it seems (Howardena), installation view, used denim fray on found cotton, 2019

This work was created as a response to rework/modify an older art piece. If the original work is concerned with loss, what can we find in between and in the gaps of a hole? As a result of becoming worn or a type of unravelling, I propose the fray of denim as a valuable and vulnerable space to examine these questions. To tend to the margin, the wound, the hole, I am interested in what was lost, using what is left in the damage or detritus from previous work. No longer junk in the margin, but an active agent, shifting and shaping itself.