I Look Like My Mother (2018)
Photography

The title of this piece comes from the first line of a poem by Lavanya Huria, “My Mother, The Goddess”(2018), which led me to an exploration of my lineage through my own mothers. I found myself wondering, Do I look like my mother? And does she look like her mother? What special connection do I share with the mothers of my lineage, and is it something that is inevitably lost over generations?

This piece is a visual representation of my emotional process, as I come to a more deeper understanding of where I come from and what it means to be a woman in my family. At first glance, it may seem that all the pictures are taken at the same point in time, or perhaps that it is a progression of photos of the same woman. I hoped to invoke questions: wondering where time is in the photograph, and how these images are connected. I continue to find myself submerged in these reflections myself as I think about my lineage.

In reality, the first picture (most left) is myself, taken in 1994 when I was three years old. The second picture (middle left), my mother, in 1972 when she was 15 years old. The third picture, (middle right) , my grandmother at 41 years old in 1973, and my great-grandmother (most right) at 85 years old in 1990. This piece is a gift to my mothers, an acknowledgement of intergenerational wisdom and trauma, and a recognition of all the history that is so deeply embedded in our bodies that it shows on our skin.