This scarf is one of the actual works from an
exhibition entitled Who are You? at the National
Portrait gallery. Each of the works in the show is
an image about the nature of identity, a snapshot
taken from the narrative of someone’s life. Our
sense of ourselves feels constant but our identity
is an ongoing performance changed and adapted
by our experiences and circumstances. We feel
like we are the same person we were years before
but we are not.
The scarf depicts Kayleigh Khosravi and her
four children who live in Ashford, Kent. perhaps
surprisingly to some, Kayleigh represents the
most likely group to convert to Islam in the UK.
What does Islam offer to a young white woman
in her twenties? The answer, I found, appears to
be a refuge from the nagging consumer pressures
and constant, often sexual, scrutiny of women
all pervasive in western society. Conversion also
offers a strong and supportive sisterhood within
the congregation of the mosque. I have portrayed
Kayleigh and her children on the symbolic
path from the temple of consumerism that is the
Ashford Designer Outlet Centre to the focal point
of the Muslim faith at the Grand Mosque in Mecca