Ava Grauls

b.1982 South Africa / Belgium
Artist based in London.

I am fascinated by the reproduction of history. Whether influenced by the location, the social memory of time or the evolution of names on a map. These shifts force us to confront our own past. Our personal values and security within a landscape become something we are no longer familier with, when we are confronted with ourselves from the outside.

My practice is tactile, handmade and mobile, mirroring the slippery, often clumsy and conflicting nature of public memory and our sense of self as a national identity.

I primarily explore the discourse of occupation—examining who is permitted to inhabit a space and who is excluded—by abstracting the maps of territorial conquest.