The five artworks that I have submitted for consideration are from my ongoing series of abstract ink drawings and mixed media works entitled Departed. 

Following my father’s death in 2020, I endured a complicated period of bereavement, creativity, disbelief, anger, and tears. Many tears. These drawings are my visual narrative of this experience; and each in their abstraction represent the meandering and, at times, conflicting emotions associated with loss. 

I used free hand-style drawing and repetitive marking to develop hidden faces, eyes, and symbols. These visual elements may be seen in Untitled (Tears), Angry Organ, and Looking. The multiple faces in each of these drawings are visible in horizontal and vertical orientations.  This is a feature that I use in many drawings to elicit connections for a viewer. Tempest and Caravan, in contrast, are more representational; yet the human faces and figures that appear in both are distorted which leaves interpretation open-ended.

My use of the colors black and white also serves a metaphorical purpose. They signify duality and the distinctions between the concepts of “life” and “death.” These colors also represent symbiosis for me. Light and dark, death and life, clarity and confusion exist in relation to one another. My practice and creation of abstract artwork has ultimately given me a deeper understanding of these relationships.

Kara Mshinda is an abstract artist with roots in photography and collage art who contributes to current visual dialogues that shape diverse and changing meanings of otherness and art. Mshinda uses accessible methods like freehand drawing, collage, and lo-fi photography to develop abstract visual narratives. Her interest in using such methods arises from her anthropological research on the practice of graffiti writing and literacy socialization. Born and raised in Ohio, Mshinda graduated from The University of Akron with a degree in Interdisciplinary Anthropology. She is an alumna of the Anthropology of Visual Communication program at Temple University.