Ma or mother is a beautiful word for everyone but for me, it is the most powerful word in the world. I lost my hearing when I was five years old and my mother taught me how to lip read. But ironically Ma was the only word that took me two years to speak or understand. I learned many words of similar pronunciation like “Pa”, “Bha”, “Ba” etc, however, Ma posed a challenge. I practiced in front of the mirror with my mother for more than two years to learn how to say Ma. This work is a tribute to the love and patience of my mother who passed away from cancer several years ago, and it is also the word that I equate with strength and resilience.
In this work, I used a 5 x 4 feet plyboard to create the frame design in the woodcut. I also created five woodcut prints of my portraits to create the word Ma in sign language. These prints along with my pronunciation of the word have been used to create a stop-motion film which is projected onto the print of the frame in a continuous loop.