Statement
Layli Rakhsha is a Perth based artist born in Iran. Printmaking and photography are her major technique and medium for most of her projects. Her works often reflect the idea of home and how memories from the past and imagination can influence how a home is visualized. In relation to her experiences of migration and displacement, Rakhsha explores home can be defined by personal experiences, feelings and emotions, social and cultural relationships and attachments to a particular place.
Besides exploring the ideas of home and particular place in her work, she focuses on photography and refining and developing screen-printing techniques in order to express, release and unfold her feelings and ideas about repetition and daily routine.
Rakhsha completed her PhD at Curtin University in 2019. She has presented several papers in national and international conferences. One of her conference papers has been published as a chapter called Nostalgia: memories of the past, longing for the future in Indian Ocean Futures: Communities, Suitability, and Security in 2016. Rakhsha’s recent article Visualizing home in Australia was published in IMPACT Printmaking Journal, Spring 2020.
Rakhsha’s recent solo exhibition Seven moments of the olive tree that was exhibited at the University of Cantabria in Spain in 2018 is drawn from Rakhsha’s memories of reading Lorca’s poetry translated by Iranian poet Ahmad Shamlou in Tehran. This work metaphorically reflects a new space where two different cultures and languages are encountered.
Rakhsha is currently an artist in residence at Fremantle Art Centre and working on her new idea and project Indian Ocean Ceremony and exploring the use of sunlight for exposing her photographs on the silkscreen. She will continue developing this project during her residency in 2020-2021.