Sangam (Confluence)
2026
53” x 88”
Cotton fabric, machine embroidery, silver thread, silver lace, hand quilting
Machine embroidery by Maheboob Malik
As I continue my inquiry of arriving with presence on Lək̓ʷəŋən lands, I find myself going back and tracing my family roots from India. My father was a young child during the Partition of India and his family’s dislocation from their ancestral lands in Bihar has served as a source point for me of the intergenerational pain that lives in my family. I decided to make a razai (light quilt), an object of comfort and warmth that many refugees carried with them during their moves. Many who were fleeing had to drop their razais enroute due to fatigue. There were places where the landscape was covered with dropped razais and personal belongings. In this textile work, I weave together Urdu, Ghalib’s poetry, place names and the waterways that my father and I have lived with to create a map that gives shape to my inheritance. My father’s journey began near the Ganga River and I find myself living with the Salish Sea. The pearl of my life has emerged from the turbulence of dislocation and movement and the generosity of life-giving waters.
گلہ ہے شوق کو دل میں بھی تنگئے جا کا
گوہر میں محو ہوا اضطراب دریا کا
نہ کہہ کہ گریہ بہ مقدار حسرت دل ہے
مری نگاہ میں ہے جمع و خرج دریا کا
Passion complains that even the heart isn't spacious enough
The turbulence of the sea became stilled within a pearl
Do not say weeping is a measure of the heart's desire
My sight contains the rise and fall of ocean tides
Translated by Rahat Kurd