To read catalogue essay by Deepanjana Pal, go to issuu.com here.
—-From Press Release
‘CAN YOU SEE ME? Contemporary investigations of the invisibilities, multiplicities and complexities of gender & sexuality at the intersection of culture and religion in the global South’. With artists Sharmistha Ray, Simeen Farhat, Amina Ahmed, Satyakam Saha, Balbir Krishan, Satadru Sovan, Jose Abad & Sandip Kuriakose
Launch Event & Opening Reception: January 29 2012, 2 p.m – 6 p.m
(A Collateral event to the India Art Fair)
2 pm – Doors
3 pm – ‘Open Contemporary’ with Leeza Ahmady New York based independent curator,
dOCUMENTA (13) Agent, and Director of ACAW (Asian Contemporary Art Week).
Ahmady will discuss contemporary art practices, curatorial and art-historical
re-considerations, and the wonders of working in an era of unprecedented access to
artists worldwide.
4 pm – Late Brunch & High Tea on Engendered Residency Terrace
PLEASE NOTE – Entry is free. However, due to the sensitive nature of the work
RSVP is STRICTLY REQUIRED at engenderednyc@gmail.com
Click here to view the Facebook event page
Engendered, the NYC based transnational arts and human rights organization proudly announces the India launch of their unique, multidisciplinary alternative arts gallery ‘SPACE Engendered’ & their artist residency/guesthouse ‘HOME Engendered’ with their opening exhibition, ‘Can You See Me? Contemporary investigations of the invisibilities, multiplicities and complexities of gender & sexuality at the intersection of culture and religion in the global South’. With artists Sharmistha Ray, Simeen Farhat, Amina Ahmed, Satyakam Saha, Balbir Krishan, Satadru Sovan, Jose Abad & Sandip Kuriakose
January 29 – February 29
SPACE Engendered, 125 A, IInd Floor
HOME Engendered, IVth Floor
Next to Bookwise, Shahpurjat
New Delhi – 49
Launch Event & Opening Reception: January 29 2012, 2 p.m – 6 p.m
(A Collateral event to the India Art Fair)
Besides the exhibition opening, the launch event will also host a talk, ‘Open Contemporary’ with Leeza Ahmady New York based independent curator, dOCUMENTA (13) Agent, and Director of ACAW (Asian Contemporary Art Week). Ahmady will discuss contemporary art practices, curatorial and art-historical re-considerations, and the wonders of working in an era of unprecedented access to artists worldwide.
About ‘Can You See Me?’
We live in times of shrinking spaces, surveillance, censorship and religious militancy. As the contemporary world around us becomes narrower and stereotyped by the second, as women’s bodies & desires become contested terrains, as marginalities get more policed, ‘Can you see me?’ persuades the viewer to ask questions about where prejudice really begins. Is it always the ‘others’ that inflict or have we all insidiously been infected by bias? Why is difference so scary? Do we see fragments of our own selves in the reflections of the other? Eight artists explore multiple selves & avatars, manifestations and fragmentations, contraband desires and marginal identities. At times provocative, at others reflective, but mostly surprising and even celebratory, the exhibition brings together figurative, conceptual, experiential and mostly site-specific works by this significant collective of emergent trans-cultural artists from India, Pakistan, US and the global Diaspora.
These are varied explorations through mixed media. From oil and acrylic abstractions on canvas by Sharmistha Ray, to urban-tech photorealist renderings by Satadru Sovan Bhanduri; from scaled nudes by Balbir Krishan (recently attacked for his non-apologetic homoerotic content) to luminous meditative light sculptures on desire by Satyakam Saha these works span an entire spectrum of artistic expression. Raising the issue of Muslim voices and identities in these times of Islamaphobia Pakistani Simeen Farhat and Indo-turk Diasporic Amina Ahmad shape their own representations through their work that comprise 3-D calligraphic sculptures inspired by revolutionary poets, and lyrical paper & material installations that recall the spiritual repose of Islamic architecture. Completing the arc are photographs: portraiture by Hose Abad and Sandip Kuriokose, both of who touch on gender and sexuality in ways that are both overt and covert.
Besides their art, quite a few of these artists are themselves part of the narrative of multiplicities. They juggle multiple selves as artist-curators, gallerists & exhibition directors. This informs their practice and gives them multiple positions from which to speak and express themselves; and gives us newer ways to see and understand.