Midlands Arts Centre, West Midlands
Nilupa Yasmin
তেরা - Tera- A Star
Tera- A Star, explored the grieving process and its connections to using craft as a therapeutic outlet.
Birmingham artist Nilupa Yasmin combines handcraft and photographic techniques to create striking works which explore the notion of culture, self-identity and gender politics. Yasmin draws upon her culture and heritage as a British Bangladeshi Muslim woman and explores issues of under-representation through weaving and photography.
The exhibition looked at three generations of the artist’s family. During lockdown Yasmin created a new woven artwork, using strips of archival family photos. This piece was influenced by the passing of her grandmother, Tera and explores the artist’s grieving process and its connections to using craft as a therapeutic outlet. The exhibition also includes two other bodies of work which explore themes of identity: Grow me a Waterlily, a series of self portraits and Shekah, digital woven fabric pieces.
In the lead up to the exhibition Nilupa worked closely with members of the community, including MAC’s Older People’s Programme – Culture Club to deliver a series of talks and weaving workshops using strips of photographs and fabric to create beautiful bespoke artworks, which participants could take home and keep.
Watch a film about Nilupa’s exhibition here.
Nilupa Yasmin
Nilupa Yasmin graduated from Coventry University in 2017 with a First Class Hons Photography Degree and lives in Birmingham. Her work is primarily lens based, while taking a keen interest in the notion of culture, self-identity and gender politics. Combined with her love for handcraft and photographic explorations, the artist repeatedly draws upon her own South Asian culture and heritage and position as a British Bangladeshi Muslim woman. The artist explores issues of under-representation through community photographic practice combined with a unique communal process of weaving, passed down through inheritance.
