Burka and Kurdish Rug

Part of the five2 series.

My work is about the items I collect as I travel and live in different places. Each holds a wedge of memories for me and looking at an item evokes sights and sounds and smells, memories of the place and the people. The burqa was bought in a scruffy suburb of Amman in Jordan. Tied in with my delight at finding such a perfect and interesting mask was a sadness for the woman who had sold it. It holds her memories as well as mine.

The Kurdish rug was purchased by my husband as an anniversary gift and hangs as a room divider in our house - a constant reminder, used exactly as it might have been used by the original maker.

Photograph by David Paterson.