Lara Chamas | according to your taste | screen print foil on faux Persian rug | 2016
Screen printed upon faux Persian rugs, purchased from Bunnings, is my mother’s hummus recipe, transcribed and edited down, written in her voice like a story. Rugs and hummus are the most palatable aspects of Arabs in Australia, both have been bastardised and commodified into mass produced products, and are symbols of tokenism. This work was made in edition of 10 for a gallery fundraiser. The repetition, production, and distribution achieved by screen printing, and use of the Bunnings rugs, mimic that of a story, or recipe being told. The rug sale to a generally white middle class art audience was essential to the concept of the work, implicating the audience it was made for. All rugs sold.
Lara Chamas is a first-generation Lebanese non-indigenous Australian artist, based in Melbourne. Her practise investigates sub topics of postcolonial and migrant narratives, specifically within the context of her cultural identity. Her practise explores this in relation to contemporary Australian and global society, and current political issues. Currently a completing her Masters by research in Fine Art at Monash University, through the use of narrative and experience documentation, storytelling, oral history / orally transmitted information, and historical texts; her research intends to explore links between narrative theory, cultural practice, current politics, the body as a sculptural, oral and political vessel. Included in this is personal experience and family history, to relate to contemporary issues in Australian society surrounding bi-culturality and assimilation.
https://www.instagram.com/lara_chamas_artist
