RACHEL RAMSIS FARAG

Biography

Rachel Ramsis Farag is a multi-disciplinary artist working on Cadigal Country. Born in Egypt, she is of Egyptian and Ethiopian descent. She has undergone extensive training in ceramic practices and additionally combines this with work in digital media, drawing and installation. Farag uses her work to excavate her identity and through this themes arise around the complexity of living on stolen land, culture and the migrant experience, womanhood, spirituality, religion and lesbian sexuality.

Artist Statement

The process of forming this work in and of itself has been a vessel for healing and discovery. There are many motifs and moments of symbolism that have emerged from an excavation of self and experience that speak to both personal and broader notions of Womanhood, Blackness and Spirituality. I see the repeated motifs of the Madonna as representing the expectations of women as imposed by Western society and its Christian hegemony and the deep yearning I grew up with to adhere to these norms. The breaking of the pattern articulates the shifting and complex journey of self perception and acceptance of difference in the midst of Euronormality. In contrast to this, the embossed portraits of Egyptian and Ethiopian queens illuminate how a collection of cultural, educational, sexual and spiritual and religious experiences contribute to the formation of a person; undefinable by categories and expectations. The crown alludes to historic Christian relics but in their new context and form they pass on their power to Black Womanhood. The vessels are reminiscent of Ancient Egyptian pottery forms. Filled with spices the senses are heightened to create a sense of familiarity, a reminder that connection to culture is transportable, even if it is only present in small moments. The vessels filled with gum nuts speak to what is found in a different landscape, one that is known well to me and more newly known to my preceding generations. It speaks to the solitude of the Australian landscape and simultaneously mourns the complexity of migrants living on stolen land. The Native soil that all of these things rest upon, gifted to the work by Elder’s of Gadigal Land, pays homage to Country and First Nations lives past, present and future.