Sarah Browne, The Invisible Limb (2014), Linda Brownlee, The Way We Dress: Hong Kong Dress (2015), and Ahree Lee, Bojagi (Memories to Light) (2015) – are screened as part of Living Canvas at IMMA, to coincide with the exhibition Kith & Kin, The Quilts of Gee’s Bend, which runs in Gallery 3 until 27 October 2025. Kith & Kin features the work of African American women from a small Alabama community whose textile works have become symbols of Black empowerment and cultural pride, celebrating African American culture and heritage.
Films in order of appearance:
Ahree Lee, Bojagi (Memories to Light) (2015), 15 minutes
Sarah Browne, The Invisible Limb (2014), 19:30 minutes
Linda Brownlee, The Way We Dress: Hong Kong Dress (2015), 2:38 minutes
Ahree Lee
Bojagi (Memories to Light), 2015
Digital video and sound, 15 minutes
Music by Nathan Melsted
Ahree Lee’s Bojagi (Memories to Light) is inspired by Korean wrapping cloths, or “bojagi”, which women traditionally pieced together out of scraps of spare material, creating an heirloom full of beauty and utility from what would otherwise be waste. Often made by mothers for their daughters before getting married, bojagis served as a memento from the past that bridged the transition from childhood home to future home. The artist Ahree Lee reimagined the bojagi as a video that uses home movies from Asian American families to create a collective wrapping cloth of memories.
Thanks to Center for Asian American Media and the families who donated their home movies to the Memories to Light archive (caamedia.org/memoriestolight/).
Music by Nathan Melsted.
About the artist
Ahree Lee is a multi-disciplinary artist working in video, new media, and textiles. Lee received her BA from Yale University in English literature and MFA in graphic design from Yale School of Art, where she studied under Sheila de Bretteville.
Her many commissions include the Craft Contemporary Museum, Asian Art Museum (San Francisco), the Irish Museum of Modern Art; the Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University; Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery; the 01SJ Biennial; the International Short Film Festival in Leuven, Belgium; the International Festival of Video Art of Casablanca; and the Sundance Channel. Lee’s Webby-nominated video Me was shown by Steve Jobs at the D5 tech conference, and is in the permanent collection of the Museum of the Moving Image, New York. Me currently has over 9 million views.Lee’s awards include an artist residency at Santa Fe Art Institute; a Rema Hort Mann Emerging Artist Award nomination; an Artist Fellowship Grant in film and video from the state of Connecticut; and an artistic career development grant from Asian American Renaissance. Her work has been written about in Hyperallergic, Metropolis, and Fast Company.
Lee lives and works in Los Angeles with her daughter and husband, Nathan Melsted, an electronic musician, who composes musical scores for much of Lee’s work.
Sarah Browne
The Invisible Limb (2014)
Single-channel HD; 19:30 minutes
German language, English subtitles, sound
The Invisible Limb is one of a number of works by Sarah Browne addressing issues of gendered labour and representation connected to textile processes. The film is partly addressed to deceased German artist Charlotte Posenenske, known both for her rigorous sculptural work and later, her withdrawal from artmaking in favour of retraining as a sociologist focused on wage labour conditions. Browne invites another sculptor of Posenenske’s generation into dialogue with this practice; Irish stonecarver Cynthia Moran. Shot partly in Moran’s studio and at the Giant’s Causeway, Co. Antrim, the film stages a series of unlikely correspondences between the women’s practices, through sculptural objects, archival research and physical gestures, exploring the magic of apparently costless production.
Directed, written and edited by Sarah Browne. Featuring: Cynthia Moran. Cinematography: Kate McCullough. Additional camera: Sarah Browne. Voiceover: Amanda Elena Conrad. Composition: Alma Kelliher. Choreography: Fearghus Ó Conchúir. Research assistants: Christin Müller, Laura Wünsche. Archives: Hessischer Rundfunk, WDR mediagroup. Translation: Petra Gaines. Colourist: John Beattie. Special thanks to Burkhard Brunn, Felix Ruhöfer, Jessica Foley, Natascha Reigger, Fire Station Artist Studios, Dublin, and Weltkulturen Museum, Frankfurt. Commissioned by basis, Frankfurt.
About the artist:
Sarah Browne is an artist concerned with spoken and unspoken, bodily experiences of knowledge, labour and justice. Primarily working through film, sculpture and performance, she often collaborates with people of formal and informal expertise (children, lawyers, poets) to establish new communities of knowledge or experience.
Significant projects in this vein include Echo’s Bones (2021-3, a collaborative film-making project with autistic young people in North Dublin, responding to the work of Samuel Beckett, commissioned by Fingal County Council); The Law is a White Dog (2020, curation of TULCA Festival of Visual Arts, Galway); and In the Shadow of the State (2016, with Jesse Jones, commissioned by CREATE and Artangel). Her solo exhibitions include Tógaimid ár dteanga le carraigeacha, Kunstverein Aughrim and Buttercup, SIRIUS, Cobh, (both 2024); Report to an Academy, Marabouparken, Stockholm (2017); Hand to Mouth at CCA Derry~Londonderry and Institute of Modern Art, Brisbane; The Invisible Limb, basis, Frankfurt (all 2014). Browne has participated in include Bergen Assembly (2019) and the Liverpool Biennial (2016). In 2009 she co-represented Ireland at the Venice Biennale with Gareth Kennedy and their collaborative practice, Kennedy Browne. She is the winner of the Golden Fleece Award in 2025.
Linda Brownlee
The Way We Dress: Hong Kong Dress (2015)
Colour and sound; 2:38 minutes
A film by Linda Brownlee with Simone Rocha
Originally presented by NOWNESS
The Way We Dress, Hong Kong Dress, a NOWNESS film by Linda Brownlee with Simone Rocha, offers a thoughtful look at cultural heritage and the inherent poetry of daily life. Inspired by Rocha’s personal connection to her father’s birthplace, the film subtly explores the interplay between identity, place, and modes of dress.
Narrated by Rocha, this work, part of the NOWNESS series ‘The Way We Dress’, moves beyond surface aesthetics to excavate the hidden narratives embedded within the act of dressing. Brownlee’s direction frames Hong Kong through Rocha’s uniquely discerning gaze, as the film journeys through the streets, focusing on the city’s women, particularly the older generation. Inspired by her grandmother and aunts, whose meticulous presentation embodied a sense of pride and self-respect, Rocha observes the women of Hong Kong’s poise and taste and the city’s unique energy. Washed-out pastels, textured twinsets, and the neatness of a hairstyle are captured across intimate macro shots, elevating the quotidian.
Brownlee’s lens equally attends to the urban landscape, noting the interplay between the architectural vernacular of high-rise apartments and the distinctive colour palettes that permeate the city. The dynamism of Hong Kong’s inhabitants, their practical movements and understated elegance, are observed with a painterly eye, suggesting a profound connection between individual expression and the collective rhythm of urban existence. Through rich imagery and astute observations, the film offers a poetic glimpse into Hong Kong’s unique culture of dress and identity, positioning clothing not merely as adornment but as a profound articulation of self within a specific cultural context.
About the artist:
Linda Brownlee is an Irish photographer and director whose practice moves across the realms of portraiture, fashion, and documentary. Her lens intimately explores the subtle dynamics of human behaviour and the profound connections between subjects and their environments. Driven by intuition, Brownlee’s collaborative process centres on capturing atmosphere and energy, meticulously capturing eloquent details in gesture and expression.
Brownlee’s work has been presented in numerous group exhibitions, including ‘Sixteen’ at Tate Liverpool, the Taylor Wessing Portrait Prize at the National Portrait Gallery, Photo Museum Ireland, and The Library Project. Her solo exhibition, ‘Idle Topography,’ was held at Hangtough Gallery in 2019, and her recent collaboration with photographer Aisling McCoy, ‘Light Aggregates,’ shown at the Dunlavin Arts Festival in 2024.
Brownlee’s published monographs include the evocative ‘Achill’ (Eighty One Books, 2010), ‘Hydrangea Etc’ (AAD, 2014), and the collaborative ‘I Zii’ (with Aisling Farinella and Workgroup, 2016). The artist’s distinctive photographic aesthetic has been featured in prominent publications such as British Vogue, The New York Times, Dazed & Confused, and The Guardian magazines. Commercial collaborations include work with brands such as Bally, Miu Miu, Cos, Simone Rocha, and Roksanda. Extending her enquiry into moving image, Brownlee’s short film series ‘Limber Notes’ was featured on NOWNESS. Collaborative film projects with figures such as Hans Ulrich Obrist, Edie Campbell, Vanessa Redgrave, and Simone Rocha have been screened at international festivals, including the Aesthetica Film Festival and the Milan Fashion Film Festival.
