Mainframe Resident Artist: Nasim Makaremi Nia, Jan-Feb 2023
January 13 to February 25, 2023
From our first residency slot of the Mainframe project, say hello to our upcoming artist Nasim Makaremi Nia!
About Nasim:
Nasim Makaremi Nia is an artist from Iran, currently living in Newfoundland and Labrador. She graduated with an MSc in solid-state Physics and is currently an MFA candidate at Grenfell Campus, Memorial University. She works in painting, drawing, printmaking, and textiles, and her Physics background is active in her art practice. She has shown works in several group exhibitions, including The Rooms Provincial Art Gallery (NL), Eastern Edge Gallery (NL), and Inverness County Center for the Arts (NS). Her art is focused on subjects such as humanity, the lives, and the emotions of women, and she uses animals and products like tampons and sanitary pads as symbols to deal with sexuality to magnify gender discrimination and censorship. Nasim received the emerging artist award in 2022 during the Excellence in Visual Arts Awards – VANL-CARFAC.
About Nasim’s Residency:
Challenge the meaning of the “LAND”!
I propose working with Virtual Reality (VR) to create virtual space. I am interested in challenging the meaning of the land via overlapping. I am an artist from Iran living in Newfoundland as an “Immigrant.”
“Immigrant” or “immigration” words go to be bold in my life which I never thought about. This is the truth after two years, I will be homesick while still in culture shock. I am wondering if Newfoundland is my land; Why am I homesick?
Why do I not understand my peers’ idioms? And sometimes, it is hard to connect with different places, people, and landscapes.
I reminded myself it is expected that my roots, my bones are not from here, but where is my land? The land behind me or the land that I am living there currently. I am confused; I ask myself which place is more effective in my life; while I will never forget my childhood, I am living in Newfoundland now. I am trying to find new directions in art. I am interested in overlapping the places and bringing my root and culture here. I propose making the VR space of Sheikh Safi Ad-din Ardabili Khanehgah and Shrine Ensemble or Sheikh Kalkhoran Shrine Ensemble, which are ancient monuments in my hometown.
I am interested in making a VR space of ancient monuments related to my hometown, culture, and background; and walking in them while I am in Newfoundland. This is the overlap between the lands and challenges the meaning of the land and the home country.