Risham Syed

Textile (Textile)

Risham Syed discovered a box of woven Chinese silk panels that was her mother’s most prized possession. Her mother had long talked about making quilts with these panels; there were many questions about what she would do with so many panels, which were ultimately used to compose Risham Syed’s work Ali Trade Center Series IV (with Buddleia) . After her mother’s death, Syed began to explore the history of this fabric as a material linked to commerce, power, social class, and culture, and thus linked to a history of violence, hardship, upheaval, and conflict.