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Myth
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Reality
Constructing Cult-u’re
Curated
by: Veeranganakumari Solanki
4th – 30th January 2011; The Guild, Mumbai,
INDIA
Participating Artists:
Charwei Tsai
(Taiwan); Job Koelewijn (The Netherlands); Johan
Grimonprez (Belgium); Mithu Sen (India); Neha Thakar
(India); Prayas Abhinav (India); Renata Poljak
(Croatia); Riyas Komu (India); Vidya Kamat (India); Vijayendra Sekhon (India)
Performances: 4th January 2011: 7:30 p.m. onwards by: Charwei Tsai and Prayas Abhinav
Film Screenings: Dial H-I-S-T-O-R-Y (68 mins); Double Take (80 mins) by
Johan Grimonprez
4th January 2011: 5p.m. – 7 p.m.
5th – 30th January 2011:
Both films will be screened twice daily at 12p.m. and 4 p.m.
For this exhibition, artists have created works based on the
notion of myth and representation. They create, valorise and
shatter – ideas, notions, ideologies, cultures, beliefs, facts and
myths.
Culture = Cult + you are = Culture is what you are.
It is what you create, construct and accept that becomes a
culture.
In societies around the world, culture and ideology co-exist. They
in turn create myths.
Myths become beliefs, which grow into facts.
Over a passage of time, a fact stirs the curious who probe – there
is an awakening –the fact is questioned and grows into a belief
and then becomes a myth...
Roland Barthes described the notion of myth
as constantly changing notions, with implications of the original.
In his collection of essays – Mythologies – Barthes revealed how
myth was created through the theory of semiotics.
When something (signifier) is used to indicate an object
(signified) over an implied period of time, it creates a sign
which loses it denotations and becomes a connotation, in turn
implying a myth.
In the contemporary world, there is a constant creation and
destruction of myths and cultures.
Myth naturalises situations and meanings that have been created to
make them appear real.
CHARWEI TSAI
(b. 1980; Taiwan)
Charwei Tsai previously earned a BFA from the Rhode Island School
of Design (2002) and is presently engaged in a research program at
the L' Ecole Nationale Superieure des Beaux-Arts in Paris. Tsai's
work has been featured in group and solo exhibitions
internationally including Ludwig Museum, Budapest, Today Art
Museum (both in 2010), 6th Asia Pacific Triennial at Queensland
Art Gallery, Brisbane (2009), Centre Pompidou, Paris (2008), ZKM
Center of Art and Media, Karlsruhe, Shanghai Museum of
Contemporary Art (both 2007), the Singapore Biennale (2006) and
the Foundation Cartier, Paris (2005). In addition to her art
practice, Tsai publishes, designs and edits Lovely Daze, a
contemporary art periodical released biannually.
Tsai utilizes a variety of media in a politically engaged,
performative practice. At once highly personal yet general in
concern, Tsai grounds herself and her art practice in a sense of
(national / Taiwanese) identity and the consequent implications.
Geographical, social and spiritual concerns inform a body of work
directed towards activating participation outside the confines of
complacent contemplation. Tsai presently lives and works in Paris
and New York. (By Jeffrey Ian Rosen)
About her works:
Ice Explorations–
35.5 x 44 inches each; C-Print; 2009; Edition 2/6
A block of ice was placed onto a piece of mirror reflecting the
sky as it melts away.
Circle
– video loop – 0:40 mins; video projection - 12 x 12 inches; 2009;
Edition 4/5
I drew a circle onto a block of ice then watch it melt away. A
circle makes both a form and a void. To draw it as a perfect form
takes discipline and to let it go takes ease. The work continues
to explore my reflection on the Heart Sutra, a Buddhist text that
I have memorized since growing up in Taiwan.
- Performance:
Driftwood;
Performance on 4th January 2011 at The Guild, Mumbai
The Heart Sutra is written onto pieces of Driftwood found from the
Kaveri River, in Vansda, a town in Gujarat, India. This will be
released back to the river after the exhibition. The use of
driftwood reflects on a journey where the wood is shaped by its
environment and is in constant flux; while the Heart Sutra
implies carrying wisdom to another shore...
JOB KOELEWIJN
(b. 1962; The Netherlands)
Job Koelewijn is an artist who engages in mind-expanding
explorations of time and space, and has a special fondness for
poetry and literature – Marsman and Beckett for instance. His work
has a clear conceptual streak. Imagination and reality are, for
him, identical entities. He visualizes ideas and transforms
thoughts into images that can be concretely experienced, which can
vary from photos and film to architectural constructions, from
small objects to (often temporal) installations that take up a
whole room.
For Koelewijn art and life move forward in a constant dialogue.
The participation of the viewer is indispensable for the works he
creates. Koelewijn has built a varied oeuvre over the past twenty
years which he has exhibited worldwide. Currently he is showing
his work in Museum De Paviljoens in Almere, NL and in The Hudson
Valley Center for Contemporary Art, Peekskill, NY, USA. He is also
travelling the world for his Spinoza Reading Performance.
About his works:
Ongoing reading project
Text, especially poetry plays an important role in Koelewijn’s
work. It is not just about recalling an intellectual experience,
but also an actual physical experience.
On February 1st 2006, Koelewijn made a statement, declaring that
from that moment onwards, he would each day read a book (from a
diverse range) out loud for the time duration of 45 minutes (one
side of a cassette tape). Starting on page one, reading out loud
the whole book, but never longer than 45 minutes a day, until the
book is completed.
This daily rhythm with an almost meditative power has resulted
into The Ongoing Reading Project. A project that has been
presented in different manners, for example in a jukebox set,
playing on request a certain book reading.
Cassettes;
Digital print on archival paper; 24 x 41 inches; 2009; edition 2/3
The 45 minutes Agreement
(Reading schedule)
Job Koelewijn reading audio books
(Audio)
JOHAN GRIMONPREZ
(1962; Belgium)
Johan Grimonprez is an internationally acclaimed artist and
filmmaker. Acquisitioned by NBC UNIVERSAL, ARTE TV
(Germany/France), and CHANNEL 4 (UK), his productions travelled
the main festival circuit from SUNDANCE to BERLIN. They garnered
several Best Director Awards, a ZKM International Media Award, a
Spirit Award and the recent 2009 Black Pearl Award (Abu Dhabi).
His curatorial projects were host at museums worldwide, such as
the HAMMER MUSEUM (LA) and the PINAKOTHEK DER MODERNE (Munchen).
His work resides at major museum collections, including CENTRE
GEORGES POMPIDOU (Paris) and TATE MODERN (London). He is published
with Hatje/Cantz (Germany), and in distribution with Soda Pictures
and Kino International. He spends his time between Brussels and
New York, where he lectures at the SCHOOL OF THE VISUAL ARTS.
About his works:
Dial H-I-S-T-O-R-Y (1997);
film; 68 mins
Praised by The Times and The New York Times as "an eccentric
rollercoaster ride through history", Johan Grimonprez's
award-winning film Dial H-I-S-T-O-R-Y (1997) depicts a freefall
through a chronology of airplane hijackings. Since its highly
acclaimed premiere at the POMPIDOU CENTER and DOCUMENTA X, it has
toured worldwide, garnering 'Best Director' awards at the SAN
FRANCISCO and TORONTO film festivals. With contributions by DON
DELILLO and SLAVOJ ZIZEK, a DVD edition was released by OTHER
CINEMA.
(More info at
www.dialhistoryfilm.com)
Double Take (2009);
film; 80 mins
In a story by novelist TOM McCARTHY, Double Take (2009) traces the
rise of television as it instigated a culture of fear. Acclaimed
by critics as “wildly entertaining” and “a delicious oddity”,it
premiered at the BERLINALE and at SUNDANCE, winning the BLACK
PEARL AWARD at Abu Dhab and the NEW MEDIA GRAND PRIZE at Los
Angeles. (More info at
www.doubletakefilm.com)
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Special thanks to Zap-o-matik for Johan Grimonprez’s films:
For the past decade, the Brussels based production office zap-o-matik
has seen its productions travel the main festival circuit, from
SUNDANCE through to BERLIN. Bagging many awards along the way, the
productions have been acquired by NBC
UNIVERSAL, CANAL+, ARTE and CHANNEL 4, and are in current
distribution through SODA (UK), FACETS/MULTIMEDIA and KINO LORBER
(NY). Curated by many of the world's most reputed museums, zap-o-matik
works have been exhibited at the GUGGENHEIM and MOMA, and find
themselves amongst the permanent collections of the CENTRE GEORGES
POMPIDOU, TATE MODERN and the KANAZAWA ART MUSEUM. On the
publications side, with DISTRIBUTED ART PUBLISHERS as
distributors, HATJE/CANTZ has put several books in print.
MITHU SEN
(b. 1971; India)
Mithu Sen received her B.F.A. and M.F.A. from Vishva Bharti, Kala
Bhavan in Santiniketan in 1991. She was awarded the Charles
Wallace India Trust Award in the UK for 2000-2001 to study at tge
Glasgow School of Art in Scotland, U.K.
Her art practice steers between creating installations, paintings
and collages with mixed media. She has held solo exhibitions of
her works at Nature Morte, New Delhi and Berlin, Bose Pacia
gallery ,New York, Chemould Gallery, Mumbai ; Albion Gallery,
London ; Suzie Q project, Zurich; Krinzinger Project, Vienna;
Lakeeren gallery, Mumbai; Machintosh Gallery, Glasgow and the
British Council, New Delhi. Her works have been included in Group
exhibitions in many international museums and galleries as well as
in India including IVAM, Valencia; Devi Art Foundation, New Delhi;
Kunst Museum , Berne; Daimler Chrysler collection , Berlin;
Brandise University, Boston; Museum of modern art(MOMAT) Tokyo;
Goethe Institute, Salvador, Brazil, Lausanne Museum, Berne,
Switzerland; SOMA Museum, Seoul.
Sen is based in New Delhi, India.
About her works:
Mithu Sen provokes the viewer to question our social values and
our actions as human beings. She invites the viewer to play and
interact with meanings of ‘self’. There is a notion of
deconstructing the old to bring in the new. The viewer is
compelled to relate to her works at a personal level, through
self-analysis of their own identity.
Myth U;
30 x 22 inches; mixed media watercolour on embossed handmade
paper; 2010
The work in this exhibition is a self portrait of the artist
...“and how friends/people like to read/see/write/call me...though
it is funny but it has an inner psychology that drives me...it’s
how people spell/ed my name...”
ME TOO
ME TWO
MEET U
MEAT U
MYTH U
MITH U
NEHA THAKAR
(b. 1980; India)
Neha Thakar received her M.V.A from M.S. University of Baroda,
India. She was a part of the PEERS 2010 Khoj Residency in New
Delhi and participated in a residency programme by the British
Council in 2009 at the Mehrangadh Fort, Jodhpur.
Thakar’s process of working enables her to see the changing visual
formation of her works through the passage of time. Through
mediums she selects – such as ice, water and smell – the process
becomes a performance in through a space of changing visual. One
can also term it as environmental art, because of the celebration
with the natural world ranging from permanent constructions of
objects and interventions with ice. The artist makes use of nature
to explore themes such as, the fleeting and ephemeral, notions of
time, the unexpected and random. Thakar is based in Baroda, India.
About her works:
Untitled
– 24 x 36 inches; 2010; mixed media on paper
Purified
– video loop; 2:00 mins; 2008-09; Edition 1/5
“One can see my work at the beginning, middle or end, and can feel
a part of it, that relates to my approach to material. Hence, the
spectator becomes a part of my work. The so called ‘Simulacrum’ in
itself turns into an artwork as the process goes on. Therefore,
the viewer who is involved with the process can see innumerable
visuals within one visual and at last a feeling of nothingness or
so called emptiness takes place, which is the core idea of my
work. The ice, which is the solid form of water, turns in to water
and finally to its origin through the process of natural
exhaustion.
In simple words, I am playing with an idea of tangible &
intangible; visible & invisible properties of the materials like
Water, Ice, Smell, Gas & extra. At the edge of this circle I have
tried to negotiate the essence of impermanency.” – Neha Thakar
PRAYAS ABHINAV
(1982; India)
Prayas Abhinav currently teaches at the Srishti School of Art,
Design and Technology and is a researcher at the Center for
Experimental Media Arts (CEMA). He has taught in the past at Dutch
Art Institute (DAI) and Center for Environmental
Planning and Technology (CEPT). His works and projects have been
supported by Sarai/CSDS (2005), Openspace India (2009) and Center
for Media Studies (CMS) (2006).
Abhinav’s recent projects have been exhibited at: Periferry,
Guwahati (2010), Exit Art, New York (2010), Futuresonic,
Manchester (2009), Wintercamp, Amsterdam (2009), 48c: Public Art
Ecology (2008), Khoj (2008), Urban Climate Camp, ISEA (2008),
Sensory Urbanism, Glasgow (2008), First Monday, Chicago (2006),
The Paris Accord (2006) and PSBT/Prasar Bharti (2006). He has also
participated in the exhibitions Continuum Transfunctioner (2010)
at exhibit320 in Delhi, Contested Space - Incursions (2010) at
Gallery Seven Arts in Delhi and Astonishment of Being (2009) at
the Birla Academy of Art and Culture in Kolkatta.
Abhinav is based in Bangalore, India.
About his works:
Even war has limits;
17” screen, joystick, text; 2010
A modified version of the Space Invaders game (a classic arcade
game) in which the confrontational process part of our social
situation plays out and becomes a semiotic conflict in which
accusations, prescriptions and cross-accusations, defence
mechanisms are made easily. The game can be played with a
joystick. Additional cross-accusations can be typed with a
keyboard.
The tiger is not a tiger (but don't tell);
17” screen, button, text; 2010
This looks at consumption-created social status. A series of
images loading up on a screen. We can vote for the image on the
left or on the right by pressing the corresponding button.
Pressing both the buttons together will take us to the
score-window, which shows which image was selected how many times.
Selection, here, is of course meant to signify desirability and
cool-sensing. A kind of literature-review of research on luxury
objects and their marketing to consumers is installed on the wall,
around the screen.
We are all schizoid;
Table, microphone, speakers, stools, 2010 – 11 (ongoing project)
Sanity is just an excuse to cling on to a world that is known:
Seven first-person stories woven around seven different contexts
and forms of power. These seven stories are kept on a table. We
can sit and read the stories - which all begin with a preamble
with specific reading directions which could help in reading the
text as text, and not treat it visually as an image. There is a
microphone on the table into which we can read the stories. Become
the character in the text and see the anomalies that emerge in our
voice as we are reading and assuming different positions and
roles.
RENATA POLJAK
(1974; Croatia / France)
Renata Poljak is a visual artist from Split, Croatia; currently
living in Paris. Her body of work is composed of different media:
photos, neon, installation, videos and film. In 2002 she received
the ArtsLink award as visiting artist at the San Francisco Art
Institute; in Museum Quartier, Vienna in 2004; and in 2008 she was
selected for the Art In General residency program in New York and
for ArtOmi in 2010.
Renata's work has been exhibited widely, in solo or group shows,
biennales and film festivals. She received several awards, such as
the Golden Black Box Award for Best Short Film at the Black Box
Festival in Berlin 2006. In 2010, a selection of her videos and
film work were exhibited in Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris and in
November 2010 during Paris Photo a selection of photos and videos
in the Carrusel du Louvre.
About her works:
“My work explores the politic upheaval and violence the Balkan
region has undergone since the early 1990s, and the ramifications
of those changes in the lives of émigrés throughout Western
Europe. Videos and installations often combine staged and even
fantastical situations with documentation of real- life
misunderstandings and misuses of power. Filmic explorations meld
autobiographical elements/experience as a woman in the former
Yugoslavia and in France, for example-and scenarios reflecting the
social and political consequences of Croatia's move from socialism
to free market capitalism. With subjects ranging from the
memorialisation of the Holocaust to the trauma of post-civil war,
Serbo-Croatian relations, my work investigates how transitional
political and economic moments can reignite brutal social customs
with deleterious effects for women and ethnic of religious
minorities.”
Figures;
print on archival paper; 23.5 x 16 inches; 2010; Edition 1/5
I need you to believe in something; (diptych) digital print on archival paper; 20.5 x 27.5 inches
each; 2008; Edition 2/5: Made in 2001, the photographs
represent two children playing the violin during a concert in the
school of Albanian village – Fier. The setting and the atmosphere
are the same lived by Renata Poljak in Yugoslavia in the early
'80s, during the period of strong faith in socialism and Tito, in
the years which the Tito’s portrait stayed everywhere. Now in
2001, behind the children, stands a new symbol of the desire, the
stars of European Union.
Videos:
video loop – In New York (3:04 mins), 2010 Edition 1/5; In Paris
(6:23 mins), 2010, Edition 1/5
Wonderland series:
Alice; 31.5 x 31.5 inches; 2002; Edition 3/5
Under the title Wonderland, Lewis Carroll’s universe of fantasy,
the exhibition conveys the idea of a very special invitation to
travel. The only source of light is bleu neon lighting with
an elegant lettering. It fills the space with a sense of hope and
disappointment. Writing with light, almost pronouncing, is
preventing something to happen: if only I can once say I’ll follow
you until the end of the world, si je pouvais dire seulement
une fois je te suivrai jusqu’au bout du monde...The desire of
elsewhere is met by the elsewhere of the past; a video
installation enriched with a photograph evokes a lost Yugoslavia.
Crveni Makovi (Red Poppies) the young Yugoslavian pioneers’ song
to the memory of partisans, the blood - like red of the poppies,
the artist’s voice reciting passages of Alice In Wonderland,
Sarajevo today, a childhood in Split yesterday, and even a fly.
The artist walking in the streets in Sarajevo or sleeping in the
grass, everything jostle together to sketch the idea of the lost
wonderland, to show the historical ellipsis between childhood and
adulthood (1991-2001). Yugoslavia of yore and the one who hasn’t
got a name anymore – today’s Yugoslavia – just one unique desire,
that of not been roused. Because this end of the world may
very well be the outcome of a dream: And if he -Tito- stops
dreaming about you, where do you think you will be?
RIYAS KOMU
(1971; India)
Riyas Komu holds a BFA and MFA from the Sir J.J. School of Art,
Mumbai, India. Driven by contemporary political issues around the
world, Komu expresses his concerns through a repertoire of
paintings, sculpture, photography and installations. “My job as an
artist is that of an activist – be it football or politics.”
Formulating, conceptualising and employing Marxist symbols that
underline his political awareness, Komu’s works not only “look
like posthumous regrets but (are) also a propaganda that has the
form of a protest.” Bringing to the forefront neglected sectors of
society and the struggle for survival, Komu’s works pursue the
viewers’ thoughts to go beyond a pre-constructed comfort zone with
a sceptical, but compassionate humanistic approach.
The artist has exhibited widely in India and internationally. His
recent solo shows include SUBRATO to CÉSAR, Gallery Maskara,
Mumbai and SAFE TO LIGHT, Azad Gallery, Tehran, Iran in
2010. His works have also been exhibited in group shows
internationally. Recent exhibitions include Emerging Asian
Artists, Gwangju, South Korea; The Astrup Fearnley Museum of
Modern Art, Oslo; Studio La Citta, Verona, Italy.
The artist is based between Mumbai and Kerela in India.
About his works:
Immortal Death-scapes 2005 (Karachi Series)
- 20 x 30 inches each; Archival print on paper; brushed silver
metal; 2007; Ed. 1/2
The Karachi Series are black and white images of cemeteries in
Pakistan. They portray the marks of natural forces - time and
weather - which, due to human neglect, have broken down the
dignity of the burial grounds. In a photograph of a flooded
Islamic cemetery, tombstones along with uprooted trees ironically
float past. Another image, this time an abandoned Christian
cemetery, depicts an isolated, erect angel seen from the back
hovering, in a cross-like contradiction, perpendicularly to the
tombstones fallen in ruin. The series treats various religions
through the optic of Heraclitus' philosophy (uncannily echoing
that of the Buddha) encapsulated in the words 'Panta Rei' that all
is just a river of constant change ultimately swept away as time
flows and ever renewed. (Deborah Jenner)
The Karachi series was created by Komu during a residency in
Karachi, Pakistan.
VIDYA KAMAT
(1964; India)
Vidya Kamat is an academician and an artist, who works with new
media. Her area of interest and research has been ancient Indian
myths and symbols. She has contributed papers in the seminars and
respected journals on the same subject. Her works have been
exhibited in India as well as internationally. Some exhibitions
include: Through Other Eyes: Contemporary Art from South Asia,
Curated by Gerard Mermoz, Herbert Art gallery & Musuem, Coventry,
England; Indian Contemporary Art Palais Benedictine, Fecamp
Paris, Curated by Ranjit Hoskote and Supriya Banerjee; Changing
skin, Mumbai curated By Marta Jakimowicz, I am saint,
New Delhi, curated by Johny ML.
The artist is based in Mumbai.
About her work:
Blooming Lotus;
48 x 48 inches; (16 panels – 12 x 12 inches each); Digital print
on archival paper; 2010; Edition 1/3
This work takes on the ancient Indian system of Tantra,
which depicts various chakras as the centres of the
consciousness. The diagrammatic structure suggests the current
state of 'Indian' consciousness where each lotus blooms in a
materialistic gain. Blooming Lotus, tries to create a linkage
between the ancient and contemporary Indian reality of the
spiritual and materialistic world.
VIJAYENDRA SEKHON
(1977; India)
Vijayendra Sekhon received his M.F.A. from M.S. University,
Baroda, India and a second Masters in Interactive
Telecommunications from Tisch School of the Arts, New York
University. Sekhon was based in New York and recently moved to
Mumbai where he is developing his independent studio practice. He
has participated in group shows and artist residencies in the US,
South Korea and India. Post his Masters from NYU, Vijay worked
with Merchant Ivory Productions as an assistant editor, cameraman
and producer. He has also assisted New York based artist Krishna
Reddy and Zarina Hashmi as a studio assistant. Vijay’s work is an
eclectic mix of drawings, paintings, sound, video, writing and
performance. He is interested in deconstructing memories and
thoughts, and constructing a narrative, which leads to new
learning and understanding of our everyday life and behaviour.
About his work:
A letter to/from the future;
mixed media on canvas (A panel of 44 canvases, 6 X 4 inches each);
2010
“I look at the work from present and future points of view
simultaneously. At one level it is my attempt to leave behind
clues for future archaeologists to uncover the world we live in?
And at second level I take the role of that future archaeologist.
I tried to imagine what will survive the time, how it may get
distorted? How over time new myths may get fused with some old
surviving ones? How reality of our time will distort future myths
and mutate new heroes and legends?”
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