“When you arrive in a new place—whether a country, age, situation—you are so new, so undefined. Everything you used to be, you are not anymore.Your identity has to be reinvented: the language, the way of thinking, the way of feeling. You feel like a blur. Your eyes are all you have in order to survive. Look, learn, adapt. Anxiety is your state of mind. And the question pops, why do we need to belong so much somewhere? Why does the feeling of not belonging make us feel unwanted and unsafe? Why can’t we belong to nothingness, to transparency, to air, to water?

I chose calico and old kitchen cloths from my previous home, to carry the memory of the old home. Moving to the unknown is reconstructing oneself from scratch. Finding the words to use, a place to feel familiar, grow new roots and leaves and flowers, finding a place to belong.”

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Christina Darras, I do not belong, 2018, embroidery on calico fabric painted with watercolours, 20cm X 20cm,

Christina Darras moved to Melbourne three years ago from Athens, Greece. She is a visual artist and jewellery designer. She studied painting at Ecole Nationale des beaux Arts in Paris, France, and printmaking at Central St Martins in London, UK and has had 20 solo exhibitions and been a part of numerous group exhibitions in Paris and London. Christina is currently collaborating with art galleries and Museums in Athens, and Melbourne.

"I don’t feel tied to a style, or that anyone has to be tied to a style in order to market his work. I feel that art is a journey to keep discovering, to keep your mind open and broaden your knowledge and potential" - Christina Darras, 2019.