Snötäckt – the weight of the snow covered all of him is about my father and his life situation. Originally from Sri-Lanka, he moved to Sweden thirty years ago. He is now in his sixties and seriously ill, which limits his ability to travel and can therefore never go back to his native country. His illness made me turn to my camera to be able to make sense of my own emotions and simultaneously understand him and his relationship with the environment he lives in.
By juxtaposing images of surrounding nature with details from his indoor environment the work emphasizes how much the surrounding nature influences one’s inhabitation, and highlights the isolation one can experience living in a place where one does not relate to its nature and how that shapes ones life. The landscape my father lives in is cold and harsh and as white as the hair on his head. I would like this to act as a metaphor to how snow weighs heavy on nature, as it is a burden to my father.
Furthermore, I wanted to challenge the notion of the landscape an Indian-looking man is expected to live in, and reflect on how black people are still associated with living in urban environments rather than in the countryside, if living in Western societies. This is much due to how immigrants have been visually represented living in minority groups in big cities, rather than on their own trying to adapt to the culture they have moved to.
My initial reason for the project was very personal and it has helped me, as a second-generation immigrant, to understand my father, while highlighting issues around race, identity and displacement.
