ADMA 2024-2025

Thread by thread, I will speak again: Unravelling Silence, Reclaiming Grief

When I was 37, my life ended. His hands on my throat, his angry breath in my face. My hopes, my plans, my family, my self… were all gone. Popping one bubble set off a chain reaction in my head, in my heart. Nostalgia had softened the edges of so many memories, I no longer knew what was lived and what was confabulated for my survival. With all my illusions deflated at my feet, I began rebuilding my life, re-imagining my self.

I tucked, untucked, and retucked loose edges. I cut every string, burnt familiar bridges, ventured to the road less travelled. I was left with two unanswered questions: Where do I belong? and How do I get home? Grief and trauma had permanently altered my preconceived notions of home and belonging. In the aftermath trauma, the idea of home, fractured into something abstract, unattainable and haunted by loss.

This research project explores the hollow of grief. What is grief made of? How can it be shared? How can it be broken into digestible parts? How can it be given to others to hold? How can it invite others to grieve? My work delves into the discomfort of sharing my story of abuse, the shame of being different and the vulnerability of owning trauma that often remains unacknowledged. It is about being seen and heard and held, in and with my grief.

Situated within the context of trauma studies, material-based art research and feminist epistemologies, this project focuses specifically on silenced trauma and disenfranchised grief. These are forms of loss that remain invisible, when the world does not recognise your pain as legitimate, or when social norms discourage public mourning for what cannot be named easily. Through this lens, I explore the grief of unmet needs, the rupture of identity and the isolation that follows the erasure of one’s voice.

My methodology is rooted in practice-based research and autoethnography, using writing, film, drawing and textile work as tools for expression, reflection and resistance. When speech felt too sharp, too slippery, I let my hands remember what my mind and heart had wanted to forget. The act of making became both meditative and methodical, an embodied grammar through which I could begin to narrate the unspeakable. The slowness, its repetition, its demand for presence, mirrored the irregular rhythm of my recovery. It allowed me to move at the pace of my own healing. In this way, material practice became both my compass and my voice.

The sculptures I create serve as companions on this journey, physical embodiments of intangible states, grief, hope, rootlessness and longing. They function not as final statements, but as open invitations: to pause, to feel, to hold space for difficult truths. Through this work, I aim to create an alternative archive of grief, one that values complexity over closure, and presence over performance.

Ultimately, this research seeks to transform personal trauma into a shared space for reflection, care and connection. It is not only a path towards reclaiming my narrative, but also an offering to others: those who carry invisible losses, who navigate fractured homes, who are still learning how to speak. This work seeks to articulate grief in material form, inviting contemplation and conversation rather than resolution.