Silver Eye

In Passages, artists Priya Suresh Kambli and Vivian Poey respond to their family photographic archives to traverse between the past and new self-made narratives. Kambli and Poey consider personal and political histories of migration and their continuing aftermath in memory and ongoing lived experiences. They share a focus on how maternal lineages inherit these complex legacies.

For instance, Vivian Poey layers family photographs with tracing paper, meticulously cut by hand to expose representations of the sea. This technique invites reflection on her family's history and the profound human impact of migration. Priya Suresh Kambli experiments with mark-marking to transform the surfaces of original photographs. Through cycles of repetition and variation, she conveys fragmentation and essential questions about representation.

Both artists' practices of recontextualization illuminate the ever-shifting relationships between history, memory, and photography. Significantly, their contemporary reassessments of the past are not nostalgic or romantic. Instead, Kambli and Poey reshape historical imagery to challenge our present and envision reimagined futures.

Participating Artists

1. Priya Suresh Kambli received her BFA at the University of Louisiana in Lafayette and an MFA from the University of Houston. She is currently Professor of Art at Truman State University in Kirksville, Missouri.

   Kambli’s work inadvertently examines the question asked by her son Kavi at age three; did she belong to two different worlds, since she spoke two different languages? The essence of his question continues to be a driving force in her art making. In her work, Kambli has always strived to understand the formation and erasure of identity that is an inevitable part of the migrant experience, exploring the resulting fragmentation of family, identity, and culture.

   Kambli’s artwork has been exhibited, published, collected and reviewed in the national and international photographic community. The success of Kambli’s work underlines the fact that she is engaged in an important dialogue and reinforces her intent to make work driven by a growing awareness of the importance of many voices from diverse perspectives and the political relevance of our private struggles.

2. Vivian Poey is an artist and educator in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Her work examines a number of issues ranging from migration and cultural assimilation to the passing of time. She is a US citizen, born in Mexico of Cuban parents and lived in Guatemala and Colombia before moving to the U.S. This complicated trajectory informs all of her work, which serves as a method of investigation, and includes photography, installation and performance. Her work focuses on personal and historical narratives, especially those dealing with cultural identities, memory and displacement.

   Vivian’s work has been exhibited widely in both group and solo exhibitions and has been featured in publications such as Fraction Magazine. In addition to her art practice, she has served as a juror and curator for several exhibitions, including Crossing Borders: personal narratives of immigration at the Sandra and Phillip Gordon Gallery at the Boston Arts Academy and the Parker Gallery at Lesley University. Vivian has also worked extensively at the intersection of arts and education, has co-authored and co-edited books including the most recent Art as a Way of Listening: Centering Student and Community Voices in Language Learning and Cultural Revitalization. She is the recipient of the 2017 Massachusetts Art Education Association Higher-Educator of the Year Award.

   Vivian Poey teaches Photography and Integrated Studies at the Lesley College of Art + Design.