“Building Blocks extends the artist’s preoccupation with micro images and dichotomies between proximity and distance, into an examination of memory and cognitive associations. This series maps the cellular make up of three elements meaningful to the artist: jasmine and soil from her grandmother’s Damascus garden, and Aleppo soap. Triggers of olfactory memories sourced from Sara’s native Syria, the protagonists of these works awaken thoughts of things and places she associates with the realm of the familiar, yet also perceived as foreign.

Using a Scanning Electron Microscope, Sara captures the cellular structure of each sample. The large-scale renditions include deliberate glitches such as formal distortions, light leaks or reticle crosslines—interferences that further abstract the works and hint at the imperfection of memory and longing.

The organic shapes that imitate topographies Sara randomly encounters during her scanning journey, explores the relief of all three samples morphed into one. Ensues the uneasy realization that coming closer is here synonymous with grasping less.” Coline Miliard