Mummy Returns

Acrylic on canvas.

30x40x1.50"

This work is a contemporary self-portrait inspired by an Egyptian digital filter, serving as a bridge between ancient visual language and modern technology. By translating a fleeting, algorithm generated image into a permanent acrylic painting, I reclaim authorship over my own representation and transform a moment of digital play into an exploration of ancestry, memory, and selfhood.

The figure is adorned with intricate markings and wrappings reminiscent of mummification, body ornamentation, and sacred geometry. These elements reference preservation, ritual, and the human desire to be remembered beyond time. Rather than symbolizing death, the wrappings act as a form of protection and continuity suggesting survival, endurance, and the carrying of history within the body. The hieroglyphic background functions as both a visual rhythm and a coded language, evoking narratives that are present but not immediately legible, much like inherited histories that shape identity without always being fully known.

By using acrylic on canvas, I emphasize bold color, layered texture, and clarity of form, grounding the work in physical presence in contrast to its digital origin. The direct gaze of the subject challenges the viewer, asserting agency and confronting the ways Black and Brown bodies are often aestheticized, filtered, or consumed through screens.

This painting exists at the intersection of past and present where ancient civilizations, contemporary technology, and personal identity converge. It is both a reflection on how we see ourselves in the digital age and a declaration of self as timeless, complex, and sovereign.