FAI 郟 KNUDSON
Self-portrait with mother goddesses, Fai 郟 Knudson, Digital painting, 12 in x 18 in.
Image Description: Four Asian long-haired mother goddesses surround and tend to the artist Fai in the center. The goddesses wear different colored and patterned Áo Đối Khâm dresses with a low table with a mirror, candles, and jewelry box in the foreground, and jade green curtains hanging in the background. Upper left Mother Goddess of Heaven wears purples, pinks, and reds with cloud designs. Upper right Mother Goddess of Earth wears yellow robes with red and pink flowers with green leaves. Bottom left Mother Goddess of Earth wears white and pale tan and blue colored robes with large wave designs. Bottom right Mother Goddess of Mountains wears sky blue robes bordered by the greens of the land, trees, and moutains, with a red sun in the sky. Artist Fai sits in the center, wearing blue robes bordered with mauve.
The concepts of mothering and kinship are nebulous to me. I met my mother once at birth, then never again. She, a Vietnamese immigrant, relinquished parental rights immediately. I was then adopted by two White parents. Through my transracial adoption, my birth heritage was forcibly replaced with the dominant culture—White, Christian, heteronormative, conservative. Any sense of racial, cultural, or queer identity was fragmented, underscored by grief and confusion.
Now, I engage in Vietnamese culture as an act of inner healing, rebellion against colonization, and identity reclamation. The indigenous religion of Đạo Mẫu particularly resonates with me; it is the worship of mother goddesses. In the Four Palaces branch, there are Mother Goddesses of Heaven, Earth, Water, and Mountains. Multiple Đạo Mẫu deities are now understood as queer, transcending gender binaries and heterosexual norms.
This piece is a representation of my attempts to bridge many chasms in my identities—racial, cultural, queer—while also depicting an alternative notion of mothering and kinship through the four respective Mother Goddesses encircling me. I was inspired by many forms of Vietnamese art, primarily drawing from "Toilette de la mariee" by Mai Trung Thứ.
Image Description: Fai 郟 in a black t-shirt with glasses and shoulder-length, layered brown hair with emerald highlights on the side and bottom.
Fai 郟 is a lifelong visual hobby artist and therapist in Pittsburgh, PA. They primarily find interest in digital collages and paintings but have also experimented with traditional mediums including pencils, gouache, and acrylic paint. Their art is strongly informed by their identities as a queer, non-binary, neurodivergent Việt adoptee. They hope to convey themes of identity, dissociation, existentialism, marginalization, and abolition in their work, but above all, their primary goal is to create art that brings them joy, healing, or catharsis.