Untitled II by Hanusha Somasundaram — ‘By taking the definitive figure of a Sigiri Apsara and juxtaposing it with the image of a tea plucker, perhaps her own mother, Hanusha transcends the bridge between personal memory and public history. ‘Much attention is paid to a group of inanimate women on a rock face while living, breathing women whose sweat and tears prop up our economy, are ignored.’’
In Sri Lanka, we proudly display tea plantations and tea pluckers on tourism posters. The whole thing is a crime scene. The British uprooted both ecosystems and Indian Tamils to plant and pluck tea. This was the entire premise of colonialism. Take from the land and the people…
