A photographic series, Racism is the Virus (2020), discusses the vapid disease of racism which persists through the generations. The Japanese text sculpted from porcelain remains unfired and submerged into a bath of water till its disintegration. The text reads “racism is the virus” in Japanese, and the title acts as the translation. Mikami makes a conceptual scrutinisation informed by repeated personal encounters with racism. During the time of Covid-19 the prevalence of racism is highlighted in the continually globalising world and countries like Australia, which the work speaks to

Lili Mikami is a Meanjin (Brisbane) and Yugambeh (Gold Coast) based visual artist who examines identity through the duplicity of her mixed socio-cultural background in Australia. Mikami’s work uses her lens as a Japanese-Australian with lived experiences in each country and the Philippines as catalysts to the exploration of culturally linked experiences, memories and gaps in cultural knowledge.  ​To dissect her ideas, Mikami recontextualises text as well as traditional Japanese items by contemporising and fusing western and Japanese influences. Mikami utilises ceramic sculpture, mixed-media, textiles, and text, presented as installations, photography, and video. She selectively uses cultural, sentimental, and traditional items and mediums to guide making.