Mery Chakma

 

 

 

1994, Khagrachhari, Chittagong, Bangladesh

 

Mery Chakma is a visual artist, who obtained her Bachelor’s degree in Painting from the Institute of Fine Arts, Chittagong University, Bangladesh, and completed her Master’s in Painting from the Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda, India. Mery has participated in the Nasreen Mohamedi Scholarship Display of the Maharaja Sayajirao University in Baroda, India(2019) and has partaken in a performance-based workshop and exhibition titled “Body responding to the Machine” organized in collaboration with Santaran Art Organization and Britto Arts Trust (2019). She was also a participant in the D’LAB Performance art workshop led by Spanish artist Alba Soto and Bangladeshi artist Joydev Roaja by Back art (2019). She has also participated as a performance artist in “In-tension”, an event led by French artist Claude Boudeau at the Alliance Française in Chittagong, Bangladesh (2018). Her exhibitions include a  group of indigenous artists entitled “সাজাকয়া ককরক (the unspoken words)” by the Bistar art gallery, Dhaka. She has also exhibited her work at the “Art exhibition for young artists” by Shilpakala Academy of Dhaka, Bangladesh. She also participated in a site-specific art camp “Sound of Nature ” by Santaran in Alikodom, Bandorban Bangladesh (2017).

 

 

Mery’s thoughts are largely influenced by the consequences of displacement, borders, and socio-political issues. The crisis of cultural identity and the question of existence plays an essential role in her practice, as well as in the media that she employs in her artistic practice. Media and material play a crucial role in her practice where they act as metaphors. Drawing on paper with marks produced by the repeated insertion of the pin; fire and smoke, the red thread, are rather violent methods to arrive at the image by damaging the skin of the paper, which reminds Mery of bodily harm and violence. 

For Indigenous people, their culture is the essence of who they are, where they belong, where they come from, how they are related to one another. Trying to reconnect and reclaim her cultural roots, history, and identity by visualizing these ideas is the purpose of Mery’s work.

 

 

Contact Details: 

Telephone: +91 9409578702

Email: merychakma07@gmail.com

Instagram: Mery Chakma

Facebook: Mery Chakma