Mascha Serga

The meeting point was a hostel lobby, a few sois away from Khaosan Road, where Mascha Serga’s studio was located. She finally showed up and was impossible to miss: green tights, high heels, completely standing out among the sea of backpackers in elephant pants.

We climbed the stairs to the space she shares with a photographer. Given how naturally confident she seemed when we first connected, her camera shyness caught me off guard. I decided to take more time and talk with her. I asked about another pair of high heels on the floor. “My painting shoes,” she answered. She’s in heels so much that flat feet feel wrong, even when she works. As I set my frame, she lit a cigarette and started to tell me her story.

Mascha’s parents met in Moscow: a Ukrainian mother and a Russian father. She grew up in Berlin, being bullied for her “eastern” roots at school and dealing with a volatile dad at home. Those early contradictions echo in her work. At first glance, her canvases are bright, candy-bright, but a closer look shows tension. Mascha sees family and love as forms of power structures that can condition us for violence rather than shield us from it. As she puts it, “The architecture of war begins in the places we’re told are safest.”

While Berlin offered her a good playground to start her art career, she later decided to move to Thailand after an earlier visit, seeing it as neutral ground for her next chapter. Her work and ideas contrast with a playful personality. She looks out of place in Bangkok but somehow perfectly at home.