A Voyage of Seemingly Propulsive Speed and an Apparent Absolute Stillness

The Exhibition
A Voyage of Seemingly Propulsive Speed and an Apparent Absolute Stillness is a multidisciplinary show, bringing together works of art by three emerging artists — Arshad Hakim, Moonis Ahmad Shah and Sarasija Subramanian. The genesis of this intriguingly titled exhibition began as a conversation between the three artists and the curator of the exhibition, Aaiushi Beniwal. The conversations about the readings around their individual practices uncovered a common thread in the form of three key words — Myth, Suspension, and Violence. These became touch-points for the theme of this group show, that brings together politics of perception and identity, through the experimental aesthetics of the artists’ recent body of work. The show carries a varied range of mediums including etching, drawings, zinc plates, videos, digital prints and LED strips.

Elaborating on the exhibition’s digital launch, Gallery Ark’s director Nupur Dalmia tells us, ‘It’s fitting that our move towards integrating digital exhibitions in our offering coincided with this show. This group of young artists is pushing the boundaries with its experimentation with mediums and a deep thinking around an alternate future. The process of adaptation during times like these needs to be a collaborative one, and the artists supported us to help bring the digital iteration of the show to life. Whilst the in-person experience of viewing art will always remain unparalleled, we are happy to be able to present a strong digital experience of the exhibition, which we hope will reach a wider audience.’

The Artists
Arshad Hakim : A graduate of the Faculty of Fine Arts (MSU, Vadodara) and the Shiv Nadar University, Arshad works extensively with the idea of ‘repurposing’. He works with photographs, text and films, re-suing pre-existing material in new forms and a range of mediums that highlight the shape-shifting nature of individual experiences. For this exhibition, the artist presents a series of multimedia works on paper — Dreams Of A Cyborg Trapped In A Drawing by Nasreen Mohamedi and Stages in Return that I did not want, a video piece titled Flubber, 2002 and a sculptural LED work titled Ourobours.

Moonis Ahmad Shah : Born in Srinagar, Kashmir, Moonis’s art practice is a hybrid of mediums like video, photography, painting and programming. He explores the questions of territoriality, the archive and memory through materials such as popular imagery, computer programming, cinema and historical documents. Moonis's primary area of focus is the question of territorial claims — an often incendiary claim that has deep implications on collective and individual identities — by looking at issues of surveillance, mass-migration and borders. A Voyage… carries four series by the artist — The Birds Are Coming, Telegrams to Bollywood from a Mad Landscape Scout, Some Other People Were Here Too and Accidentally Miraculous Everyday From That Heaven — that articulate his thematic engagements and the hybridity of his practice. Moonis currently lives and works in Melbourne, Australia. 

Sarasija Subramanian : Steeped in research around the natural world and how we as humans interact and build relationships with it, Sarasija’s art practice combines scientific truths, mythological narratives and political consequences. She uses an extensive archive of images and objects that she has developed, to derive cultural and political analogies with the natural world. One of her series in this exhibition, Sea Monsters/ Bred in Captivity, stemmed from her research at a Coral hatchery in Ireland. Documenting the development of these ‘man-made’ corals that will never know their natural habitat, Sarasija refers to the sea monsters imagined in Irish, Greek and Indian mythology. Her other series in the show, Dictionary of Gardening, refers to an English 19th Century text, an encyclopaedia of Horticulture.

View the exhibition here: http://galleryark.viewingrooms.com/viewing-room/