What story are you telling? Sarah-Mecca Abdourahman, a Somali-Indian multidisciplinary artist, is at a phase where she is reconsidering her narration. For the last few years, Sarah-Mecca’s art has delved into her family’s heritage. Currently she emphasizes healing, memories, trauma responses, and her own experiences as a first-generation Canadian. Based in Ottawa and Montreal, she works on exploring herself with the help of painting and video art. Sarah-Mecca seeks to critique our cultural landscape with the intent to heal, rather than to amplify more trauma for both herself and her audience.
“Canada is and isn’t home.”
While growing up in Canada, Sarah-Mecca often felt an innate disconnection from her parents’ homeland, a place imprinted in their memories, but foreign to her lived experience. The concept of ‘home’ is not just a location for her, but a perpetual question mark. She frequently references the “third space” theory by Homi K. Bhabha. It speaks about the ambiguous area that emerges when two or more cultures intersect in ones life. For Sarah-Mecca, this space is where she exists—between the Canadian landscape she knows and the ancestral land she yearns to understand, always navigating the nuances of identity and belonging. In Canada, Sarah-Mecca feels somewhat adrift, yet when she visits her parents’ homeland, she unmistakably stands out as a tourist.
The painter’s urge to create was always an innate pull, a calling she felt from her deepest core. With a mother who was an art school graduate, her initiation into the world of art began early. Her mother’s position at the National Gallery of Canada meant Sarah-Mecca spent many summers immersed in art camps, surrounded by creativity and inspiration. For Sarah-Mecca, the path was clear because she never envisioned a life outside of art. Although she attended an artistic program in high school, her university years became a quest to decipher what her art truly sought to convey. It was only post-graduation from Concordia University with a Bachelor of Fine Arts, that she truly came to realise the voice and message she wanted in her art.
Sarah-Mecca is finding her voice
Sarah-Mecca Abdourahman’s work predominantly features paintings. That medium flows most naturally for her, yet she finds video to be the most exhilarating and enjoyable form of expression. She hadn’t ventured into video since her university days in 2019, but as a full-time artist this year, she is revisiting the medium. Sarah-Mecca strives to incorporate the themes prevalent in her paintings into her video work. She relishes this approach, as it allows her to explore familiar topics with an added layer of humor and playfulness.
images by PILOTENKUECHE or supplied by artist
From pain to healing
One prevalent theme in her self-curated upcoming solo exhibition revolves around her personal experiences and those of her community living in the West, particularly in Canada. It delves into the idea of memory, it’s role in sculpting our ethnic identity, and the point at which these memories become burdensome weights. As Sarah-Mecca delves deeper into her artistry, she discovers that her research often leads her through landscapes of pain and grief, not only from her own past but also echoing the memories of her ancestors. This journey, while enlightening, is often emotionally draining for her.
She collaborated with a friend and fellow painter, Laurena Finéus, on a big three-part mural installation. This artistic endeavor was a reaction to the resurgence of the Black Lives Matter movement, a period that both found profoundly challenging. Bombarded with distressing images in the media, and growing up contending with harmful coverage of their countries of origin, they felt a need to sift through that narrative and present a work that showcased the diverse facets of their Black identity. Their hope was to reflect its richness beyond the singular lens often portrayed. As young Black Canadians, these artists both felt uneasy and numb because of their experiences. They questioned how growing up in this western digital culture has affected them. While the journey was challenging, it was profoundly healing for her to not only highlight the pain, but also celebrate the joy. Even if the beginning stages were very difficult, both artists found the culmination to be deeply therapeutic.
Telling her own story
Sarah-Mecca Abdourahman is eager to explore and experiment with new approaches in her art. After her mentor posed the question of whether the continuous research of her parents’ life experiences in the homeland ever became monotonous to her, it dawned on her how she had restricted herself to that singular theme. It was her recent art pieces, centred on healing, that made her realise the desire she has to explore more of her own experiences rather than her family’s ones. This is something she hopes will come to fruition during her time at PILOTENKUECHE, as well as the residencies she plans on undertaking next year.
Written by Tess Haverney
Keep up with the latest from Sarah-Mecca on her website and instagram
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