Childlike Conciousness, Drawing Series, 2024
“HERE BY DRAGONS” was a term used by European cartographers to fill in the voids of unexplored territories with illustrations of dragons and other mythological creatures. Wherever there was the unknown, myths emerged to explain it.
These geographic voids no longer exist, but the notion of dragons persists as a metaphor for the mythologies that are used to fill in the voids of identities. In the January 1985 issue of Playboy, an essay originally titled “Freaks and the American Ideal of Manhood” by James Baldwin shifted the meaning from where the dragons are to whom they represent. For the ‘Black’ diaspora, the dragons dwell at the meeting point of two seas—between the coastlines of Britain and Africa. Here, a mythology shapes diasporic identities, navigating an idea of ‘home’ between paternal migrant narratives of a ‘homeland’ and stories of the lands we inhabit that feel as foreign.
Graphite and Sumi Ink on Cartridge Paper
114.5 cm x 84 cm
Graphite and Sumi Ink on Cartridge Paper
114.5 cm x 84 cm
Reverse falling, 2024
Graphite and Sumi Ink on Cartridge Paper - 2024
102 cm x 137 cm
Graphite and Sumi Ink on Cartridge Paper
102 cm x 137 cm
Graphite and Sumi Ink on Cartridge Paper
204 cm x 137 cm