Prerna Chandiramani
Artist Prerna Chandiramani explains how precious letters sent to her from her father in India have fundamentally shaped her printmaking practice.
‘Imagine you’re writing a letter to somebody…..it could be anyone. Your parents, your friends, your mortgage provider, your bank manager, or maybe Boris Johnson. Think about the emotion attached to what you’re about to write. It could be anger, it could be love, friendship – anything.
Then, take a piece of lined paper and manipulate it by pleating, creasing, folding, crunching, tearing – anything at all – whilst you think about the emotion attached to what you were about to write in your letter. By doing this, you are translating that emotion onto the piece of paper. Folding, pleating - any which way you like – there’s no right or wrong. You’re doing something to that piece of paper so that it changes from being flat piece of paper into a 3D form. And that is what my work is about – it’s about communication, it’s about responding to letters; letters which I received from home when I first moved to this country.
This is going back twenty years or even more – when my father used to write letters to me. As I was working on this project, around two years ago, he passed away. So, the contents of those letters have a very strong emotional connection, and the lines on the paper provide access to the memories of those letters. They are something that is tangible that I can hold, that will always remain with me.
I like using colours in my work but they’re not strong – they’re very subtle – because that’s what I’m trying to express. The work has a very meditative, calm, peaceful quality. I call this series of prints ‘Silent Stirrings’ because that’s what they’re about - they stir your heart and show the emotional connection that you can have with a simple piece of paper.
There are lines on the paper that the letters were written on. The story behind those lines is that my father used to tear pages from school notebooks, simply and easily recycling those pages, and write something on them that was so precious and memorable to me every day of the week. I have so many letters from him’.
Prerna Chandiramani, Silent Stirrings, 2019, variable edition relief print, 56 x 53cm, edition of 10
Prerna Chandiramani graduated from Mumbaii Univeristy in 1990; she went on to study at UWE in Bristol graduating in 2016. She has shown work widely in the UK particularly in London and Bristol, and also in Athens and Australia. Her work is held in collections including the V&A and she currently makes work at Spike Print Studio in Bristol. To enquire about Chandiramani’s prints please contact us.
This transcript was taken from a recording of the artist speaking at a talk hosted by Oliver Projects at Woolwich Contemporary Print Fair, November 2019. To view this video please click here.
