Designboom_ Backdropped by the New York City skyline, a collection of vibrant artworks by Suchitra Mattai is scattered across the Socrates Sculpture Park. The exhibition, We Are Nomads, We Are Dreamers, transforms the park into a space of contemplation and an exploration of identity, diaspora, and the reclamation of history. This sculptural installation is part of a busy year for the LA-based artist, represented by Roberts Projects, whose work continues to challenge and reframe the boundaries of art, culture, and memory.

Mattai’s work and practice is deeply personal, rooted in her experiences as a child of Indian parents who emigrated from Guyana. Her family history of indentured servitude, brought by the British from India to work on sugar plantations, is a powerful undercurrent in her work. She draws from this rich, complex history to create pieces that challenge colonial and patriarchal narratives, using materials and techniques passed down from her grandmothers. The result is a body of work that merges the domestic with the mythic, the past with the future, and the personal with the universal. We Are Nomads, We Are Dreamers will be on view at the Socrates Sculpture Park until August 25th, 2025.

In Socrates Sculpture Park‘s We Are Nomads, We Are Dreamers, Suchitra Mattai interweaves memory, myth, and material culture. The installation features six ‘pods’ made of worn saris and mirrored stainless steel, organic shapes that conjure glacial deposits and embody the artist’s vision of an imagined mythological landscape. These pods are at once sculptures, and artifacts from a future where the diasporic experience is celebrated and reclaimed. The saris, sourced from South Asia and its many diasporas, are woven together to create a tapestry that symbolizes a community rejoined after the scattering forces of colonialism.

The artist‘s process is as much about the transformation of materials as it is about the transformation of narratives. Vintage saris, found needlepoints, and paintings are reimagined into new forms, layered with beading and embroidery to add complexity and depth. These craft-based practices, traditionally associated with the domestic sphere, are elevated in Mattai’s work, collapsing the divisions between high and low art. The transformation of these materials serves as a metaphor for reclaiming and rewriting history, where the labor of women is not only recognized but celebrated.