POI / भारत के लोग

POI / भारत के लोग

  Installation details:

1. Printed mosquito net of 12ft height
1. POI video: 45 min duration

1. Map video: 5min approx. duration

1. Audio File
 

Credits:

Sound design: V. P. Mohandas

Compositor: Manish Raut
Editor: Archana Hande & Rikhav Desai

Image credit: Dr, Bhau Daji Lad Museum.

Installation site: Dr Bhau Daji Lad Museum,

Most of the images in this installation draws from the Museum’s collection of rare books, photographs, paintings and prints to essay a reading of how an Indian identity was constructed in the 18th, 19th and early 20th centuries by the British. Using the Museum collection as the frame of reference Hande creates a topography of images both contemporary and historic that emerge like ghosts and disappear in a shroud that is actually a mosquito net, ephemera from the past seeking to inhabit a tangible form in the here and now.

The artist speaks of her interest in the idea of how identity has no origin and is a constantly shifting ontological construction that changes with each passing moment. However she explains that the human need for security and certainty prevails and we are co-opted into believing that which others wish us to believe. The issue of what is authentic, what is pure and original as a cultural construction is questionable and difficult to substantiate as the very act of practice in the present mediates and changes the original.

Hande uses the idea of a mosquito net, a British import now used ubiquitously in India, as the protective layer which encloses the ephemeral images of the hundreds of types of people which she has sourced both from her own personal collection and from the Museum. She speaks of a semiotics of identity, signifiers which become codes of connection or disharmony. “This language is performed through a documentary practice which transforms the original idea in its very practice,” she says.Using video, assemblage, popular imagery and sounds to create an immersive experience the artist asks us to reflect on who we are and how we have come to see ourselves....
Tasneem Zakaria Mehta

 

 

Circle the World in 24

Circle The World in 24

Technical collaborators:
Wooden objects: Gurunath Rajaram Mestry,
Carpenter: Arjun Prajapati
Mechanical and Electrical design: Ramesh Vishnu Anjarkar,
Consultant: Ajit Shirke
Animation Compositor: Sandeep Badgujar

This Film is about conflicting and shifting landscapes.
They emerge out of my journeys which I collect through oral recitation, objects and photographs.

The paradox lies in the fact that the actual physical space is closeted, unconnected to the world it inhabits. My work is about these "closet" spaces that are static for the time they exist, but have the ability to be fluid and change hands within a span of 24 hours, 24 minutes or 24 seconds. it is about friction and in the same time it is fluid, contradiction of thoughts or situation is the content of the "Static motion".

These fictional landscapes and narratives are constructed in different mediums: here the diorama lends itself to being theatrical - motionless, yet mobile.

duration: 8.20min

2013-14

This body of work is about conflicting and shifting landscapes. They emerge out of my journeys, which I collect through oral recitation, objects and photographs. One of the fragments of this interior space is a call-centre. While a call centre is wired to connect to the universe, the paradox lies in the fact that the actual physical space is closeted, unconnected to the world it inhabits. My work is about these "closet" spaces that are static for the time they exist, but have the ability to be fluid and change hands within a span of 24 hours.

These fictional landscapes and narratives are constructed in different mediums: here the diorama and the film lends itself to being theatrical - motionless, yet mobile.The use of documentation and diorama is very mega metro centric. The concept of temporariness is focused.

 

 

 

 

Feral Trail Part 2

The research - II
WA 2013 

Part - 2

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"Afghans of Australia"
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There are many such certificates says Identity/nationality: Afghan - Country India, Baluchisthan..
 
There are other names too: 
'Cameleers'
'Australian Muslims'
'Pathans' 

If I d-code these titles in terms of my understanding: Meanings

Afghans - 
Do You need to travel in a 'Ghan express' to become an Afghan? The journey takes 54 hours to travel the 2,979 kilometers. Named after the Afghan Camel Drivers. 

Afghan doesn't translate to Afghanistan - Geography has some part to play but the main actor is the abstraction of a region or the identity of the trade route. The issue is the abstraction has also lead to a loss of an identity of Human race. Maybe that is the nature of the migration.

The country They could be from:
Baluchistan, Afghanistan and the north-west of British India (Punjab, Rajasthan, Kutch)

they spoke: Pashto, Dari, Baluchi, Punjabi, Sindhi, Urdu, Kachchhi, Gujarati ... not sure if they spoke Hindi. 

Cameleers - double humps or single hump? nomadic or semi nomadic? what is semi nomadic - does it mean their upper body is in Kutch and lower body in Rajasthan?

Before I go on with Cameleer I would like to expand on Camels: 

There are three types of camels, which are one-hump camels, two-hump camels, and camel cigarettes. 

One Hump Camels: Called: Arabian Camels or The Indian Camels.
Short Tempered or you can also say they can be too expressive and behave badly. 
Used by Nomadic people. Evolved mostly in the dessert
Used to the Sandy salty deserts
Found mostly in Sahara Deserts.  

Two Hump Camels: 
Better behaved than the one hump camel. 
Has a history with the Silk route trade. 
They are good Swimmers.
Evolved in mountainous regions.
Founds mostly in Gobi Desert

Camel Cigarettes:  Most current Camel cigarettes contain a blend of Turkish tobacco and Virginia tobacco.

 * The other things are mostly same to all category. 
like: they are mostly vegetarians, brown in colour, they can go without food for many days and walk and walk and walk and be a good explorer.












Ok I now come back to Cameleers: why the one hump camels were more popular than the others? the only reason i can see is - they were used to the salt desert and the Cameleers who came along (the South Asians) were supposed to be very hard working and honest.....as I said migration changes the nature of human behavior...

They came to help the 'explorers' to find Yellow metal - as I know the South Asians are quite crazy about this metal and the biggest consumer - I am wondering how much these cameleers collected for themselves - ultimately it is Gold.

What I heard is the 2 hump camels were first tried (which might have come from Saudi Arabia) but dint work in this Arid salt red earth desert. - but I dont have any proof....

Australian Muslims - I dont understand this term. What I understand there were 40% of the cameleers who came to build the infrastructure in late 19th and early 20th century were 'Sikhs'(they are not Muslims- yes they do wear a turban). Few were Hindus and Sindhis and approx 40% were Muslims (my reading about this is from talking to people...I dont have the correct statistics) 

Though it is not right in my part to make statements but still I dont understand this term - this cant be the modern translation of Afghans. I still prefer the Title Afghan to Australian Muslims - as I repeat Afghan could be an identity to a region not to any particular religion...

Pathans - What I assume (looking at the images of the 'Afghans') most of them look like Pathans. Most of the Pathans from that area were nomadic and were cameleers. Broad shoulders and quite tall. 

There are few more questions in my mind which I am still figuring out-- they are: 

Q1: As India was under the British rule - (British India)when these Afghans came to Australia - Still why they were called as "Afghans" why not "Indians"... ?

Q2: As I see most of them boarded the ship from Calcutta port which is in the extreme east of India and all the cameleers came from extreme west of India-- why they had to cross the country with their camels? whereas there were two active British port in the west of India - Bombay and Karachi. 

Q3: What happened to the influence of these people in the area they traveled in Australia? - language food and culture - why it absolutely vanished - in today's day cant see any traces of it.