THE LAY OF THE LANDA WORK IN PROGRESS

CURATED BY ANUSHKA RAJENDRAN

Adeela Suleman (Pakistan) | Amna Ilyas (Pakistan)Charmi Gada Shah (India) | Danushka Marasinghe (Sri Lanka)

Imran Channa (Pakistan) | Kedar DK (India) | Niyeti Kannal (India)Pala Pothupitiye (Sri Lanka) | Pradeep Chandrasiri (Sri Lanka)Sarika Mehta (India) | Shailesh B R (India) | Sujith SN (India)

Thisath Thoradeniya (Sri Lanka) | Waseem Ahmed (Pakistan)

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What if we were to perform an alternative cartographic exercise upon experiential dimensions of space and time, and ruptures within them? What if we were to orches-

trate a letting go of ego-centric seats of power as determiners to accommodate a mobile fulcrum that roams through the margins and ventures into the cracks? What

if we were to execute an exercise that strays away from holistic pretensions to zoom in on microscopic, qualitative descriptions that reveal cross-eyed, short-sighted or

long-sighted, astigmatic, tactile perspectives that break out of vacant quantifications? A mapping of rituals and taboos, gestures and their decoding, text as meaning and

its vacuity, memory and its erasure, the archive and its fallacy, remembered anecdotes and televised accounts, identities and their discomfiture, religious motifs and their

contemporary inversions, cultural complexes and their annihilation through the autobiographical, history and its reiteration … ‘The Lay of the Land: A Work in Progress’ is

indicative of a desire to chronicle some of these constructs and their collapse.

From the colonial cartographers who dismissed indigenous, non-representational forms of spatial knowledge and the psychogeographies1 of Situationism, to postmod-

ern schizophrenic2 experiments with cartography, the utilitarian and conceptual treatments of maps as ways of charting knowledge or acknowledging the limitations of

that knowledge have always been aesthetic projects. When built upon the notion of two-dimensionally communicating spatial information effectively, they often remain

empty caricatures that extract and canonize physical boundaries and territories as emblems of power and means to authenticate versions of disputed borderlines. In

their most obvious renditions, maps reveal themselves as flat testimonies to the flawed project of objectivity. And what if we zoomed in on these rubrics of territorial

form? We encounter blank spaces peppered with fragments of geographic descriptors – empty aesthetic transcriptions, often antiquated iconographic shorthands for

geographic markers, and quantified topographies. The irony remains that despite attempts at ‘harmonious’ assimilation of parts into a whole, maps are instrumental only

when inferred in parts. In the context of South Asia, with overlapping histories of colonialism, ethnic divisions, communal tensions, marginalization, border disputes, living

indigenous traditions whose needs and demands contest impositions of political power, language politics, and centuries of conquests and border fluidity, maps have been

imposed upon maps. This exhibition rejects the processes that seek to profile ‘region’ based on geographic descriptors, except through their inversions, and definitive

narratives of political and cultural trauma3 that are generated by carrier agents such as the media, the state, law and others who have the agency to do so.

Lived experiences of spaces inscribed within maps present an entirely different vocabulary of social relations, unfamiliar landscapes, emotional realities, contradictory

testimonies, dialectical narratives, and memories and their particularities. ‘The Lay of the Land’, a phrase with origins in connoting the survey of land in its literal sense,

but has folded to signify ‘the general state of affairs’ or ‘the disposition of circumstances to be studied’, allows for the imagination of artists as surveyors capturing vivid,

graphic, glimpses from their own vantage points. And these non-maps do not incorporate canonical aspirations. Nor can they ever be absolute or complete. They are

self-admittedly, a work in progress towards charting lived experiences.

1 Guy Debord, Introduction to a Critique of Urban Geography2 Fredric Jameson’s use of the term schizophrenia from Postmodernism, or, the Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism and not from the Deluzean reading of the anti-oedipal. Subverting political maps has been a preoccupation for many

conceptual artists since the 1960s including Claes Oldenberg, Jasper Johns and Nancy Holt.3 Jeffrey Alexander, in his book Trauma: A Social Theory, uses Benedict Anderson’s argument in Imagined Communities that nations are imagined on the basis of traumatic events that have affected a collective thereby defining

themselves and other-ing the rest, to emphasize the fundamental argument in his social theory of trauma – that trauma needs to be represented. The construction of the traumatic event then becomes instrumental in the way it is

processed by the community, and the construction of these narratives in public memory often falls within the hands of institutions such as the state, law, media and also to an extent the aesthetic.

- ANUSHKA RAJENDRAN

CURATOR’S NOTE

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Memories Series Graphite and Eraser on Paper27’’ X 41’’2015

IMRAN CHANNA

Memories Series Graphite and Eraser on Paper27’’ X 41’’2015

Imran Channa tests the claims to authenticity made by the pho-tographic image. In this series of works, he recreates found pho-tographs in graphite and uses an eraser to peel off the images,

revealing the constructed nature of archives and reportage.

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Eraser on Paper IVEraser on Paper52’’ X 35’’2015

Eraser on Paper VEraser on Paper52’’ X 35’’2015

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AMNA ILYAS

MappingEtching on Perspex (Acrylic)24” x 22”2015

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1981 - 2015Etching on Perspex (Acrylic)12” x 8” 2015

UntitledEtching on White Perspex (Acrylic)10” x 14”2014

Amna Ilyas contemplates text for its formal elements, and the visual and conceptual maps that emerge from it. And its construction as a process of authenticating knowledge, as part of acts of power that create an illusion of truth, which is by nature ephemeral and transitory. It describes how our culture is more accustomed to the tone of text rather than its actual formulation. Her works throw light on the auratic effect that texts can hold, and the various meanings they acquire through the ages; pages from Nasreen Mohamedi’s diary, whose contents she feels have the same relevance as it

did in her time, inspired 1981- 2015.

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KEDAR DHONDU

Dark DawnTea Wash and Gouache on Paper22” x 60”2015

Dark DawnGouache on Paper7.5” x 10” (Set of 12)2015

The artist captures the little known, unique history of the Konkani speak-ing community of Siddhis of African origin, brought to Goa as slaves from the 15th century onwards when it was still under the Portuguese rule. They are now settled in the district of Yellapur in northern Karnataka, where they eventually sought refuge.

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SARIKA MEHTA

Passing Through...Watercolor on Paper9” x 5”2015

Passing Through...Watercolor on Paper9” x 5”2015

Passing Through...Watercolor on Paper9” x 5”2015

Passing Through...Watercolor on Paper9” x 5”2015

The artist’s interest in geography and its formal pedagogy pre-cipitated in this series of works during her time spent by the sea in Mumbai where she watched the birds. As they roam, border territories and manmade boundaries matter to them just as much as the woven strands of a fishnet, pliable to the slightest tug.

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SUJITH SN

Stains of StimuliWatercolor on Paper 10” x 12” (each)2015

Stains of Stimuli are emotional maps of places that Sujith SN has lived in, drawing from his experience of them, and the impressions they left behind. The vast expanses of sky and landscape in this series of works evoke various states of mind and provide the context for the artist to consider the archi-tectural impact upon lived spaces and the power relations that it signifies. These are visions that come to be triggered by symbolic representations of terrains. To what extent are these associations learned and not organic? For the artist, identity, as it is linked to places is shaped by abstract memo-ries and not easily defined representations of territories. The more one tries to be specific, tangibility becomes even more elusive.

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Stains of StimuliWatercolor on Paper45” x 69”2015

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WASEEM AHMED

KarachiPigment Color, Silver Leaf on Archival Wasli 13” x 10”2015

UntitledInterfacing Pigment Color, Silver Leaf on Archival Wasli 10” x 14”2015

In this series, Waseem Ahmed continues his deli-cate use of the miniature style, to explore politically charged issues and identity. The works remain critical of the current, often media generated, caricaturing of the Islamic identity as threatening.

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UntitledPigment Color, Perforation, Silver Leaf on Archival Wasli21” x 14”2015

UntitledPigment Color, Silver Leaf on Archival Wasli 7” x 11”2015

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ADEELA SULEMAN

Blood Will Have BloodFound Porcelain Plates with Enamel Paint8 X 8 inches2015

And Then it will FlowFound Porcelain Plates with Enamel Paint6.3 x 6.3 inches2015

Blood Will Have BloodFound Porcelain Plates with Enamel Paint8 X 8 inches2015

In this series, Adeela Suleman continues her work with found objects. On porcelain plates, she maps contemporary contexts by charting a pictorial history of heinous acts from the past, to indicate that history reiterates itself. This series is part of an ongoing mapping of our times that she has been involved with over the last year.

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PALA POTHUPITIYE

Northern Tip of Sri LankaLinocut Hand Print on Watercolor Paper, Archival Ink10” x 16”2015

The Other of Jaffna - City of ColomboLinocut Hand Print on Watercolor Paper, Archival Ink16” x 10”2015

Jaffna Map – Fishhook AnchorsLinocut Hand Print on Watercolor paper, Archival Ink10” x 16”2015

The artist uses motifs that recur in his works such as the shirt, fishhooks, and decorative elements from traditional arts to make these imagined maps come alive with Sri Lanka’s history of colonization and ethnic tensions, focusing on the cities of Jaffna and Colombo.

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SHAILESH BR

Nail Went in to CrossWood, Nail and M-Seal36” x 8” x 6” 2015

DANUSHKA MARASINGHE

TraceFull HD video, 5 min Looped, Color, Sound2015

The artist picks up on memory traces left by his personal experience of political events specific to his context in time and space. Though these are embedded in his past, the present/absent traces don’t wipe away. He picks up on them to build the psychological landscape in this video that questions issues such as power structures and surveillance from which there is often no escape.

Shailesh BR’s sculptures and instal-lations are an extension of his draw-ings through which he explores the various possibilities of a concept. The work Nail Went into Cross is one such extraction from a larger process. His works ask questions such as “why an object exists, how it came to be, its dispositional meaning and what it will become during its ‘life’ and after its ‘death’”. In this work he traces the journey of the nail within the larger political connotations of the crucifix-ion. He imagines a dissection of the cross to which Jesus was nailed to re-veal the simple yet invisible process of hammering a nail, and the now in-visible hand that hammered the nail.

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PRADEEP CHANDRASIRI

Addressing the Nation IAcrylic, Print on Acid Free Paper16” x 11”2015

Addressing the Nation IIAcrylic, Print on Acid Free Paper16” x 11”2015

Translation of Sinhalese text: Dress among dresses: From the late 1800s, the long sleeved, soft shirt from the shoulders to the knees, and two-yards cloth is considered the national dress of Sri Lanka. Normally chosen in a light color, the length and the neck of this dress has changed with time and according to the various sections of the society. On suitable occasions, the wearing of the national dress by a Sri Lankan male is of great respect to his country. The artist juxtaposes a contemporary advertisement he found in newspapers on the 4th of February, the Independence Day of Sri Lanka with found, documentary images of the ethnic conflicts that resulted in a civil war that lasted almost three decades.

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Addressing the Nation NCP IAcrylic, Print on Acid Free Paper14” x 11”2015

Addressing the Nation NCP IIAcrylic, Print on Acid Free Paper14” x 11”2015

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NIYETI CHADHA KANNAL

UntitledMixed Media on Paper23” x 25”2015

UntitledRapidograph, Collage on Paper35” x 25”2015

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UntitledCollage on Paper8” x 6” each2015

The artist is preoccupied by the transient to-pographies of urban spaces – ever climbing skylines, buildings under construction and the whir that entwines them. Her abstract works enmesh these various geographies, often hy-perbolically, giving primacy to the experience of these landscapes and necessarily escape fidelity to actual architectural spaces.

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CHARMI GADA SHAH

Model 1Balsa Wood, Enamel, Adhesive12” x 16” x 4”2015

Model 2Balsa Wood, Enamel, Adhesive4” x 6”2015

Charmi Gada Shah maps from memory the architectural spaces of the houses that she has lived in over the years that were testimonies to her personal experiences and subjective reflections. These painstakingly recreated miniature renditions attempt to transmute the

recent past and personal into experiences of form and space.

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Model 4Balsa Wood, Plaster, Paint 2015

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THISATH THOREDENIYA

A Search for a New BeginningWatercolor on Acid Free Archival Paper 8 x 8 inches2015

JugglerWatercolor on Acid Free Archival Paper 8 x 8 inches2015

The Sandalwood TreeWatercolor on Acid Free Archival Paper 8 x 8 inches2015

Thisath Thoradeniya picks up the figure of the joker, who occupies the margins of society and has no ostensible relevance except as an entertainer. Yet his comical acts mirror his context, and he carries its weight while treating it with lightness. The joker becomes an appropriate channel for

the artist to articulate the anxieties stemming from his own personal experiences.

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Between the Clouds and the Earth IWatercolor on Acid Free Archival Paper 8 x 8 inches2015

Between the Clouds and the Earth IIIWatercolor on Acid Free Archival Paper 8 x 8 inches2015

Between the Clouds and the Earth IVWatercolor on Acid Free Archival Paper 8 x 8 inches2015

Between the Clouds and the Earth IIWatercolor on Acid Free Archival Paper 8 x 8 inches2015

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A New BeginningWatercolor on Acid Free Archival Paper 8 x 8 inches2015

Between the Clouds and the Earth VWatercolor on Acid Free Archival Paper 16 x 20 inches2015

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Creeping Out IWatercolor on Acid Free Archival Paper 16 x 20 inches2015

Creeping Out IIWatercolor on Acid Free Archival Paper 16 x 20 inches2015

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Adeela Suleman (Pakistan)

Born in Karachi, Pakistan, Adeela Suleman (1970) lives and works in Karachi, and is currently the Assis-tant Professor and Coordinator of the Fine Art Department at the Indus Val-ley School of Art & Architecture. She is also the coordinator of Vasl Artists’ Collective, Karachi. Suleman has done her BFA in Sculpture 1999, Indus Val-ley School of Art and Architecture, Karachi, Pakistan, and has an MA in International Relations 1995, Univer-sity of Karachi, Karachi, Pakistan.

This work that I have been doing since last year, maps the times we live in by creating a pictorial history. It captures something heinous form the past and reproduces it in the present and it ap-pears as relevant as it was in the past. The work strives to map the times and events we live in. I work with everyday objects, which through its multiplica-tion and assembly, becomes the del-egate of a new, stimulating inner vi-sion.

Amna Ilyas (Pakistan)

Born in Pakistan, Ilyas (1980) has done her Bachelors in Sculpture at the Na-tional College of Arts (NCA), Lahore, Pakistan and has taught at the NCA as a lecturer on sculpture. She has also served as a research assistant at the NCA.

The series of works is made up of the very idea of using words on pa-per or constructed in the form of pa-per. Yet these works do not fall under the category of normal paper-bound volumes. Instead the format of this product is a formal quest that has led to conceptual excursions. The mate-rial, which is used is opaque plastic (or white Acrylic) which seemed to substitute the whiteness of the pa-per. The empty space inside an open book cannot communicate beyond the verbal noise that is no more than an exercise in rhetoric. It describes how our culture is more accustomed to the tone of a text rather than its actual formulation.

Charmi Gada Shah (India)

Born and raised in Mumbai, (1980), Charmi Gada Shah completed her Bachelors degree in Fine Arts from the L.S. Raheja School of Art, Mum-bai, and her Post-Graduate degree from Chelsea College of Art, Lon-don. In 2009 she received the Art In-dia ‘Promising Artist Award’ and The FICA Emerging Artist Award in 2011 alongside Sujith SN.

I often work with built spaces that are invariably either abandoned, neglect-ed or in a state of disuse; through the process of revisiting them, and build-ing or innovating on their outlines. I draw attention back to these spac-es and their disjuncture in time and space. Employing different media, in-cluding drawing, sculpture, photogra-phy, film and architecture, she formu-lates a network of correlations that play on notions of memory, destruc-tion and conservation. The works, as installations, become in-situ reposi-tories of documentation, fiction and mimesis.

Danushka Marasinghe (Sri Lanka)

Danushka Marasinghe (1985) was born and raised in Negombo, Sri Lanka. He studied at the Digital Film Academy, Sri Lanka Foundation Insti-tute, Colombo and Faculty of Visual Arts, The University of Visual and Per-forming Arts Colombo (2007) and was part of the ‘Art need space’ Pub-lic art workshop at German Culture Center, Colombo in 2007. Marasinghe is primarily a video-artist interested in exploring modern society, through socio-political issues, surveillance and the modern manifestations of privacy, or lack thereof.

Imran Channa (Pakistan)

Born in Shikarpur, Sindh, Pakistan, Imran Channa (1981) lives and works in Lahore, Pakistan. He studied for his MA (Hons.) 2008 at the Visual Arts, National College of Arts, in La-hore and is currently a finalist for the Sovereign Asian Art Prize 2010, Hong Kong. He teaches at the National Col-lege of Arts, Lahore.

My works vaunt attention to detail. Working with multiple mediums like painting, drawing, sculpture and in-teractive art, I experiment with colour while highlighting their contrast against plain white backgrounds. Some of my well-known works are in-spired by the Badshahnama series in Mughal Miniatures. In my recent works I emphasize the way history has been wistfully fabricated by those who were given the responsibility to pre-serve its authenticity. My large graph-ite drawings are a deliberate act of making and erasing records from his-tory, until it merges into single plan by compressing time and motion.

Kedar DK (India) Based out of Goa, the Hyderabad-born Kedar DK studied for his Mas-ters degree in Fine Arts (Painting), at the Sarojini Naidu School of Perform-ing Arts, Fine Arts and Communica-tion, Hyderabad Central University, Gachibowli, Hyderabad (2008), and his Bachelor in Fine Art (Painting), Goa College of Art, Goa University, Panaji, 2005. He is the recipient of the

artist bios + statements

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KAVA4’, Kashi Award for Visual Art, Kashi Art Gallery, Kerala, 2008 and the State Art Awards, Goa (2003-04)

In the history of Goa, the Portuguese treated the ‘black image’ with op-pression, alienation, emasculation and abuse, and most of the Christian families used to have slaves as work-ers in their rich houses. Even today we can find dark-skinned workers, with African resemblance working as do-mestic help in most Christian homes. During Portuguese rule, the Africans were brought to Goa by the Portu-guese to do menial work. At a certain stage, the slaves left Goa and settled in the neighboring villages of Goa and Karnataka out of sheer fear of torture and inquisition from the Portuguese. They were Siddhis, a black African community that still speaks Goa’s Konkani language. My work brings out these issues of sadism; brutality, sexual perversion, innocence, stoicism and the metaphysics of hope enacted and embodied by characters across Goa.

Pala Pothupitiye (Sri Lanka)

Born in 1972, Deniyaha, Sri Lanka, Pala Pothupitiye lives and works in Ko-rathota, Colombo, Sri Lanka. He stud-ied for his BA at University of Kelani-ya, Institute of Aesthetic Studies, and also has a BFA in Sculpture, Colombo, Sri Lanka (2002), and has training in traditional Pakistan sewing methods and techniques, with craftsmen from Lahore, Pakistan alongside studies in metalwork and jewelry. A thoughtful and subtly political artist, Pothupitiya has established himself as a vital ex-ponent of ‘90s trend’ Sri Lankan art. He confronts the compelling political issues raised by the war in Sri Lanka and explores questions like caste, dis-tinction between art and craft, tradi-tion and modernity in his works. Com-ing from a background of traditional craft artists and ritual specialists, he incorporates and reinterprets certain material and philosophical contents of traditional art in his work.

These three maps bring focus to the northern area of Sri Lanka and its cap-ital Colombo. The maps are personi-fied in a very unusual manner, dress-

ing them with a shirt, symbolizing the power politics connected mainly with colonization and Euro-Western ideas. Many other motifs, symbols and tra-ditional decorative elements in the map, talk about the geo-political and ethnic tensions in these two key cities of Sri Lanka; Colombo and Jaffna.

Pradeep Chandrasiri (Sri Lanka)

Born in 1968 in Kandy and work-ing and living in Colombo, Sri Lanka, Pradeep Chandrasiri is one of the more acclaimed artists belonging to the first generation of younger art-ists to have come into prominence by the ‘90s’ trend in the later years of the 1990s. Chandrasiri studied his BFA (Painting and Sculpture) at In-stitute of Aesthetic Studies, Univer-sity of Kelaniya, Sri Lanka in 1997 and has a Diploma (Archeology) from the Postgraduate Institute of Archeol-ogy, University of Kelaniya, Sri Lanka, 2003. The main focus of Chandrasiri’s work has always been violence, more specifically; political violence, made ever more poignant by the end of the civil war.

Our independence day is on the 4th of February. In that month, in the last two years, Emerald Company pub-lished an advertisement in Sinhala, in Sinhalese newspapers for the Dress among dresses: A long sleeved soft t-shirt that is considered the national dress of Sri Lanka. In contrast to the text and image of the t-shirt I have placed images with naked bodies or people. The selected images date back to ethnic-political violence era of Sri Lanka, which stretched over nearly three decades. The advert with the dress is juxtaposed or superim-posed with the people and bodies without dresses are sandwiched into an artwork with my paint strokes. My brushstrokes create a visual sense of topography. An emotional topogra-phy, if you will. I hope this is a differ-ent kind of a visual-art-cartography. My earlier works already have a cer-tain sense or elements of maps.

Sarika Mehta (India)

Born in Ahmedabad, Sarika Mehta (1980) completed her Diploma from C.N. College of Fine arts, Ahmedabad

in painting in 2000, and then worked in a studio space at Kanoria Centre for Arts. In 2004, she did her Post-Di-ploma in printmaking from M.S. Uni-versity, Baroda and started working at Priyasri Art studio while living in Baroda. Mehta consequently partici-pated in an artist residency program in printmaking at Jean-Yves Noblet Contemporary Prints Studio, New York. My works are gentle aesthetic ex-plorations of emotions and states of being. This series of small format, water-colours focuses on migrations, borders and the porous nature of these borders. Birds are a recurring motif in these works, since nature is unaware of these geopolitical bound-aries, which are created by mankind. We often see birds migrating and for them sitting on the fence that may divide two countries, has no ramifica-tions at all. I, like a fakir, want to be lost in the beauty of these emotions, to float away while seeking to remove all hindrances that separate us from nature.

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Shailesh B R (India)

Having studied in two completely di-verse artistic pedagogies viz. CAVA, Mysuru and The Faculty of Fine Arts, M.S. University of Baroda his artis-tic practice derives generously from both. Shailesh BR works towards the creation of a “machine” or the “me-chanical”.

My oeuvre is almost a cabinet of cu-riosities, my studio like a workstation and laboratory. My formative educa-tion and having grown up in a village where electricity is a distant luxury, influence my work.

Sujith SN (India)

Sujith SN (1908) was born in Baroda but grew up in various cities in South India during a period of rapid urban-ization. His practice is informed great-ly by these spatial transformations. He received his BFA from College of Fine Arts, Trichur, and MFA from the Sarojini Naidu School of Fine Arts, Performing Arts and Communication in the University of Hyderabad.

I create artworks that map how spatial rhythms and territorial boundaries of modern urban landscapes inevitably lead to violence. My work addresses the relationship between politics and architecture and its effect on modern societies, and specifically how mod-ern architecture has come to shape the political, social, and cultural be-haviors of its inhabitants. Urban pan-oramas and their haphazard growth and deterioration are the references that drive the impulses of my works that convey desolate, reclusive and volatile cityscapes.

Thisath Thoradeniya (Sri Lanka)

Born in Colombo Thisath Thoradeniya is a self-taught artist coming from the historical city of Kandy. He received his initial training at the Vibhavi Acad-emy of Fine Art. He is currently based in Colombo and works as a full time professional artist. His art practice of over 6 years includes painting, sculp-ture, installation, and object art. He has participated in a number of interna-tional art residencies and workshops in Bangladesh and Mauritius, and his

work was exhibited at the Asian Art Biennale 2008 in Dhaka, Bangladesh, and received the Honorable Mention Award.

The joker is a recurring persona that I often work with. Commonly known as a comical character the joker’s main purpose is to bring joy to the viewer with his playful acts, jokes and antics. On the other hand like a wastepipe that transfers dirt or the venomous serum of a snake, his own surround-ings in life receive him like a non-stopping destructive cycle, leaving him unstable only to see it amass in a vociferous outcry, which is yet a whis-per. The joker, a character never taken serious by the spectator and society, will have to find his own way out, even while commenting on society.

Waseem Ahmed (Pakistan)

Waseem Ahmed (1976) was born in Hyderabad, and he now lives and works in Lahore, Pakistan. Ahmed at-tended the National College of Arts in Lahore where he attained a Bach-elor’s degree in Fine Arts (Miniature

Paintings) in 2000. Since 1993, the artist has been ex-tensively exhibiting his works in in-ternational museums and galleries in Australia, Pakistan, India, Japan, UK, Switzerland, Greece, France, Nepal and Turkey.

The Mullah is one of my recurrent char-acters. They are delicately painted like saints or princes and their expression is filled with inner peace. Gardens are another recurrent subject matter symbolizing visions of paradise and they are often embellished with fine calligraphy. Also women wearing the Burka frequently appear in my work hinting terrorism and fear. My final aim is to represent the contradiction which lies between our life of desires and the transiency of life.

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Identifying with its geographical locale in one of the prime art hubs of New Delhi – the village of Lado Sarai, the gallery is called Latitude 28. As the name suggests, the latitude of New Delhi situates it aptly while giving it a global frame of reference. From the metropolis of New Delhi, Latitude 28 over the years has become synonymous with cutting edge art coming out of the country, seek-ing out fresh perspectives and innovative thinking in its attempt to stimulate commercial interest in new waves of art-making.The establishment aims to cultivate a space where collectors and art enthusiasts can interact with emerging artists and their prac-tices. Its strategy allows the space to act as a horizontal environment where younger artists are able to contextualise and reference their work with the masters of Indian art, even as the ethos of the gallery encourages them to experiment with medium, material and institutional critique.

The gallery shows veteran artists like Anupam Sud and Baiju Parthan alongside younger, upcoming artists like Prajjwal Choudhury, Kartik Sood, Anindita Dutta, Dilip Chobisa, Deepjyoti Kalita and Shweta Bhattad. The space maintains an outlook that accommo-dates South Asian art practices and has neo-miniaturist Pakistani artists like Muhammad Zeeshan and Mohammad Ali Talpur in its fold. An emphasis on critical thinking and discursive engagement prompts the gallery to accommodate curatorial projects that weave artworks together to demonstrate the concerns of the curators, and consciously tries to initiate renewed readings of artworks in various contexts. The most recent example was the exhibition ‘Sacred/Scared’ curated by cultural theorist and critic Nancy Adaja-nia that interrogated various connotations of the idea of the sacred. Shows that deconstruct established modes of looking at works, presenting them with renewed relevance and reassess outmoded norms of the white cube, are part of the curatorial agenda.

Latitude 28 recognizes the shift from survey exhibitions and museum displays to international art fairs and biennales, as sites where dialogues on the contemporary take place. The gallery attempts to support contemporary Indian art not only through exhibitions, but also by supporting residencies and organizing outreach programs, seminars and talks. Its recent endeavor is a bi-annual resi-dency in collaboration with 1Shanthi road, Bangalore supporting various out-of-the-box initiatives and artists and writers pursuing experimental work. It also recently supported an outreach initiative, TAKE on Writing – Critic Community: Contemporary Art Writing in India, an initiative by its sister concern, the quarterly art magazine, TAKE on art.

Through these initiatives and many more projects in the horizon, Latitude 28 is still growing as a contemporary art venture, continu-ing its investment in fresh approaches to contemporary art. Latitude 28’s vision is shaped by its Founder/Director, Bhavna Kakar, who has over a decade’s experience as a curator, writer, and art consultant.

Latitude 28 supports its sister concern, TAKE on art (www.takeonartmagazine.com) India’s leading contemporary art magazine. Bhavna Kakar is also the Editor and Publisher of TAKE on art.

about latitude 28

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