By Manasi Nene
Using odd materials to create art is nothing new – we’ve all made things with glue and pasta, but some artists go even further. Here’s some art made out of breakfast cereal. If that’s not your palate, try some horses. Or a shark. If that doesn’t work, period blood is possibly your medium.
Thankfully, not everyone goes so far. Meet Sheena Liam, who has a slightly more manageable medium – sewing thread masquerading as hair. Her Instagram is full of embroidery with creative ways of showing hair and expressing herself and her characters.
From big works to small, most of her artwork portrays women in everyday situations – she never clarifies what exactly these women are doing, but it’s fairly clear that it’s an attempt to show women during their most ordinary humdrum days, using a physical aspect, a marker of beauty, to make her artwork pop out.
Buns, hair in braids, messy hair – there’s some simple, yet special emphasis on women who refuse to look perfect all the time, and that’s a pretty bold political statement. Her women are scratching their heads, cutting their own bangs, weeping, eating, or tying up their hair into a bun the way a man would usually roll up his sleeves. The panels are minimally furnished, yet they do the job.
Political as it is, it’s doubly refreshing to see this sort of women-doing-everyday-things art from someone in the beauty industry. Sheena Liam is also the winner of Asia’s Next Top Model, and her personal Instagram account is an ode to the life of a fashion model.