American Historian Lewis Mumford, in ‘The cultures of Cities’, says “The mind takes form in the city and in turn the urban form conditions mind . The city thereby constructs multiple urban narratives that constantly overlap, intertwine and contradict.” Drawing references from these narratives, my attempt is to document the slow transitioning fabric of our urban landscape.

The recent set of works is a series of collages featuring Balsa wood and Isograph pen on Paper. Thin strips of wood are sliced and built into a veil like structure. Layers of balsa are interlaced into the drawing, creating linear yet three dimensional landscapes. I got interested in shifting layered environments and materials during my residency at Gasworks in 2019 where I looked into the architectural history of London. I was fascinated by the various physical materials that layered the eclectic fabric of the city. Over the period of time, the material requirements changed and the experience of the city changed and what we see today is a disruptive prose of stone, timber, bricks existing within the bling of the reflecting glass facades.

The current set of works draw references from urban situations, such as abandoned lived spaces that stand shielded with a tarp, tottering piles of ripped homes that lay on a vacant plot or towering scaffoldings holding on to the structures until they are instructed to reveal. A veil/ a mask / a screen / a facade - all of it conceals the true print of the landscape as it slowly morphs underneath.