Non ya

"Non ya" (None of your business) is a portrayal of my newly formed multinational family in Berlin. – A coming together of multiple cultural heritages, three different identities and family ideas – A decipherment of the otherness, and establishment of the common.

By stripping away the associations of origin and heritage, each person, their surroundings, and the everyday objects they interact with tell stories to create a new narrative of “home, family and identity”.

We see evidence of our life and shared household. They are private, and provoke thoughts and emotion, but also serve as a sort of documental proof to the authorities during my partner’s and my stepdaughter’s immigration process. Other things become sculptures, and morph into something new, just like this family. These objects are our memories and ideas, and represent our past, present, and future.

My partner (USA/JP), my stepdaughter (JP) and I (GER) started living together as a family in Berlin (GER) 2017, after we met in Los Angeles (USA) in 2016. These three evolving identities came together in a small 1 ½ room apartment in Kreuzberg-Berlin (GER) in late 2017. Finding myself in a parental role and family situation while dealing with their migration in the same time inspired me to start this project.