From
my childhood I have beheld community conflicts, riots, and identity
controversies in the context of Assam. My memory is loaded with the visuals of
burning houses/ villages in the past. They have created a psychological tension
and fabricated a silent space in human psyche not only for that particular
community but also have extended the anxiety in the surroundings. I have tried
to depict that psychological violence and the silence in this performance. I
believe that when these kinds of conflicts happen, a space of illusion/delusion
is created in our psychology because every conflict is a product of political
manipulations that have happened in the past. I have related this narrative to
that of “Lanka Daahan” from the Ramayana metaphorically where Hanuman had burnt
the state of Lanka.
the constructed space, Campus of Gauhati University... // June 2015
For
this performance the space was created like the space where to the violence,
riots, community conflict constantly happening in Assam emerged from political
benefits. I think peoples like police, politicians, social activist, common
people (so called) are perform differently in the space where the riots or
violence or community conflict were happening. These kind of performing
gestures are use in my performance try to create the narrative in a visual
form. Though I am using a microphone and sound is not there. The sounds come in
to viewer psychological space and emerge many questions and provoke to rethink.
Indeed,
the anthropomorphic from is re-interpretation of a mythological character from
Hindu epic Ramayana which I feel a connection to all conflict. I burn myself
the tail and turned it off. Here I used a GAMUSHA (a traditional textile used for prestigious purposes in
Assam) to hide identity of the performer and also it is a type of satire.
Man and Tail, Venue : Gauhati University. Duration 25 minutes, June 2015
To watch the video of this performance : click here
This work is dedicated to Mahant Laldas who was shot dead under suspicious circumstances in the night of November 16, 1993. Laldas was appointed by a court of law as the chief priest in the Ramjanmabhomi temple 1983 and continued in the position until the year 1992. The Babri Masjid was destroyed on December 6, 1992 and Laldas opposed the demolition of Babri Masjid.
I get inspiration from the documentary on Babri Masjid, named “in the name of God” directed by Anand Patwardhan, to do this photographic performance. I think, the incident happened in 1992 for the sake of the birth place of Lord Rama was a re-interpretation of the myth by the Hindu fundamentalist group and they created a drama to manipulate and provoke the people.
process
In my work I am using some still images from the documentary to represent my ideas and the figurative image, anthropomorphic from is re-interpretation of a mythological character from Hindu epic. Times to time people are re-interpreting mythological stories in different manner. The constructed narratives in this work are not only reflecting the incident of 1992, metaphorically it is also related to the all narratives of violence, and conflict between communities because of religion.
Conflicting space is a project under Srinagar Biennale where
rather than public art project this exchange is about making a visual narrative
between two different conflicting spaces. Both the spaces “Howrah and Sweden”
in one hand carrying a potential living historical memory, on the other hand
also has the hidden possibilities of contradiction. In this Art project the
artist from India and Sweden are trying to question and explore the area of
hidden possibilities through their different kind of medium. The exchange and
the collaborating with two curator one is from Sweden Tamara de Laval and Chi muk from
India starts with a dialogue between the artist which is more about idea of
space, intimacy, bonding, struggle, body, labor and contradiction of nature and
culture. Also the artists are trying to evolve the possibilities of conflict
between visible and invisible line where there is always much hidden
disturbance and conflict within the space and the space become the boisterous
silence.
Here the idea of this project, collective is very important role in my practice. Because of this reason I like the idea of Conflicting space where this project not limited only to produce an Art product for final display. Though it is important also this project focus on process which can help to share, discuss with each other work and going through a collective approach. Also it helps to Artistic growth where every steps going through research based.
"They live, we SLEEP"
A project under "Conflicting space" // Srenagar Biennale
by Anupam Saikia.
“They live, we sleep” is a small exercise of this project
where I attempt to question the “living and sleeping” by using different Audio-Visual medium.
"They live, we SLEEP" (i) Digital Photograph, 2016
I am trying to break the silence through process of working.
I believe that the coexistence of fear and violence in our everyday public,
personal and private spaces lead to the regimentation and disciplining of
everyday work conditions. As a consequence, the possibility of workers’
self-control on their work in the area of knowledge production as well as scope
of developing of anti-hegemonic subjectivity constantly faces a threat. The
‘thoughtpolice’ keeps us under the invisible surveillance, which operates in
different layers and levels ,continuously posits a coercive boundary on what we
practice in our everyday life and even when we try to question these fear and
violence through performative action. And I believe that these fear and
violence fabricated a silence space in our psyche unconsciously.
This video clip is a small exercise and tried to explore the boisterous silence. In this project what we the all artist produce will be display in the month of April 2017 at Sweden and Howrah.
In the medium of “Art
performance” ,the politics of the body is very prominent i.e. more physical,
solid, existential, contextual in front of the audience where audience can feel
the attachment, connect - reconnect with the visual that emerges from the medium.
I am exploring the body as a surface and playing with it and try to understand
the politics of surface through my experiment. The visuals or images of my work
and performances I have made so far tried to explore the nature of chaos and
violence in my surroundings camouflage in our psychology also being an Assamese I would like to
relate my Assam experiences with the recent global developments.
I am engaging with
those questions that how personal narrative has an important role in the social
context, how the personal narratives or conflict are become universal? This
project starts from a personal dialogue within family members. The narrative is
like: when I am working in studio at Guwahati my parents called me every day and
told about violence, murders, negative news, riots, community conflict, bomb
blast etc constantly happened in Guwahati, and many other places of Assam. These
kinds of news are travels to my home through electronic and paper media which
is badly sensationalized by media. It is obvious that my parents worried for
his son. Meanwhile, I should convince my father everyday that I am fine,
nothing happening to my area where I live. These phone calls irritate me,
though I can knew these things from news paper and this personal talk forced me
to think why they worried so much?, they affected badly unconsciously, even I
was not near to place where all these things are happening. They got the news
that was too much sensationalizing, too much provocative which is create a fear
and violence in human psyche. I think this hidden disturbance or unconsciously
this conflict, how we see or how we were made to represent and it’s enhanced a
delusion – illusion in our human psyche.
I started to cover every
object of my studio space with news paper. It took a time and helps me to
understand how unexpected stories came into our life and it controlled our work
condition as well as creates suppression in our psyche.
work in progress
I covered
all the materials that I am using in my studio practices and using my body to
interact with those objects. Also I am covering my body with news paper
and perform in the constructed space. It is similar to act of inscribing
me with report which deals with the political turbulence as well as transforming
the personal narrative in to the social context.
"On the body" venue: Painting studio 01, Dept of Fine Arts, S. N. School, University of Hyderabad. Performer: Ranjan Kumar, Sarvani Varicharla and Anupam Saikia Duration : 8 days / 2014
This work
is an inside and intimate studio space where I performed. And I wanted to
intervention in public spaces where the audience cannot be defined by the artist.
It is also challenge to the artist to act (?) in public spaces and
psychologically conscious in every moment where artist has to respond the
situation. I selected the common space (shopping complex) of University of
Hyderabad where I can interact with the student through my body. Therefore I
covered my body with news paper at my studio and stated walk on the road of
university campus.
"Camouflage text" 2014 Venue: Campus of University of Hyderabad
Walking inside the campus of University of Hyderabad
Students intervening on the body
This walk
is like everyday walking to the tea stall and having tea, gossiping with the
friends at the evening and tries to create a dialogue with the students. During
the conversation I got lots of questions on the public space. I was thinking
about the materials what I am using in my performance that was why I am using
particular news paper, what is the important role of the context?
With those
questions I want to intervene in the context of Assam. Meanwhile I started to
study local news paper from 2008 to 2014 and tried to find how they manipulated
story or link with incidents happened to the context of the people where I
found much relation between different stories. I collected some important news such as
violence, riots, community conflict, bomb blast, political chaos, identical
conflict etc and got some link within it. If we study and compare one month of
different news paper than we can get the point what I am talking about. Albeit
the inspiration came from the personal stories it is becoming universal. The
manipulations enhance a delusion-illusion space in our human psyche which
fabricated a silence space in human psyches embodied produces fear and
violence. The coexistence of fear and violence in our everyday public, personal
and private spaces lead to the regimentation and disciplining of everyday work
conditions. As a consequence, the possibility of workers’ self-control on their
work in the area of knowledge production as well as scope of developing of
anti-hegemonic subjectivity constantly faces a threat. Is the structure where
we live, how we live, our choices, interpretations, thoughts, vision, etc
already constructed/created? For the sake of this we can’t identify what is
going on? Or what will be going to happen?
In this
performance I juxtaposed many news
headlines carry different narratives, create a new story and pasted on the body
by two another people who are covered the body with the help of Gamusha (kind
of textile used for prestigious purpose). I tried to create some question and public
rethink towards those stories.
Performer detained by police
To watch the video:You Tube Link
After one
and half hour of performance police came to performance space and took me to
their custody. Almost 5 hours of detention by police. I think the act,
intervention spontaneous reaction of police also part of the performance.
Albeit police took me from performance space, my performance not ended there.
The mass media was reproducing the narratives and the images travel to door to
door.
