My practice is based on the generational household differences as a British South Asian woman, which is portrayed through roti making. The use of clay links to the materials my Grandma and her Mother used in order to make an Indian stove, the ‘Chulha’, to cook roti’s on when they lived in India. I recreated this object for me to become more connected to my roots and understand the diasporic journey through cooking. 

The process of rolling out clay allows me to treat this medium as an actual roti, through this I can demonstrate the process, skills, and techniques of making them. The cracks and tears illustrate the imperfections and reality of my exasperation rolling out roti.This will associate with British South Asian women who understand the pressures of roti making.”Culture is learned and passed through generations and includes the beliefs and value system of a society.” (Bhugra and Becker, 2005).

Filming and photographing making roti with my Mother, cooking on the Chulha and my personal struggles making roti enable my practice to inform and tell stories of generational experiences with this traditional object.

My installation is inspired by artist Jasleen Kaur’s “I Keep Telling Them These Stories (your body as an instrument)”, (2018) installation. The projection of the footage of “family, identity, origins, memory and colonialism…” convey the visualisation of the motions of these events, which is something I want to showcase. The projection allows the viewers to observe the film through the background that it is displayed on, making the audience understand the correlation between both pieces.