Heart Left In the Bag
Watercolor, acrylic ink, paper, 318x200 cm each work, 2024-2025
Photo credit: Plato gallery
Heart Left in the Bag originated from a series of dialogues and interviews conducted by Katya Muromtseva with women immigrants living in the United States. The project explores how perceptions of time and history are transformed by displacement and the experience of being shaped by forces beyond one's control. The work is based on conversations with Leyla, who emigrated from Azerbaijan; Hengameh, who left Iran following the revolution; and Angie, who moved from the Philippines. All three have spent years working as nurses in the United States. Their careers placed them at the center of major historical events: Leyla worked in a public hospital in New York during the COVID-19 pandemic, Hengameh witnessed the AIDS crisis in California, and Angie cared for patients in a cancer ward.
Muromtseva asked each woman the same question: “When did you start feeling that you were living in history meaning that your life was being shaped by larger events beyond your control?” Their responses became the foundation of the project, which reflects on migration, memory, labor, and the intimate ways in which historical events are experienced and remembered. The title derives from a statement by Hengameh: “When I left my country, I had only my bag with me. I left without my husband, family, and friends. I packed my luggage, but I felt heavier than the bag itself because I left my heart in the bag.”
Installation view (Plato Gallery, New York City, 2025)
Details:
