In the 530 sq mt area, Karode has kept the space fluid. “I chose not to have a symmetrical design, wishing for more odd edges and unusual encounters,” she says. The idea is to evoke resonances through the works displayed, and “to keep the temperament of the pavilion meditative — to pause and reflect.”
Jitish Kallat: “Every visitor brings a different personal, social and historical experience to the work, in a way altering its meaning,” he says. ‘Covering Letter’ is a piece of historical correspondence beamed on to a curtain of traversable dry-fog — a letter written by Gandhi to Adolf Hitler in 1939, urging him to reconsider his violent means. “Like many of Gandhi’s life experiments, this correspondence seems like an open letter destined to travel beyond its delivery date and intended recipient — a letter written to anyone, anytime, anywhere.”
Shakuntala Kulkarni: Consisting of a suit of armour woven out of cane, it provides a tongue-in-cheek comment on how the physical space around women’s bodies is violated on a daily basis.
Ashim Purkayastha: The artist’s 2003 works, ‘Farmers’ and ‘Holy Water’, are two sets of postage stamps. In the former, the benign face of the farmer becomes a death mask, and the crop affected by blight, while the latter has the water from a tube-well changing into rivers of saffron, with flames licking the edges of the stamp. “They... are projections, often bizarre and fantastic, but also a sharp socio-political critique,” writes the artist.
GR Iranna: The artist revisits his 2010 work featuring padukas or holy slippers. “Naavu is a Kannada word that means ‘together’. It is symbolic of when we are all united and stand in solidity for a cause,” he says. Padukas are worn by monks and reflect the principle of non-violence (they minimise the risk of trampling insects and vegetation). Attached to each slipper is also an object that indicates a profession or religion, like a pair of scissors (for a tailor). “This stands for their individuality and indicates that while we are together, we continue to retain our unique identity,” he says.
MF Husain: The painting, Zameen — a historic work that brings together ruminations on India’s syncretic nature — was first shown at ‘Hundred Years: From the NGMA Collection’, in 1994. It provides an ‘alternative view’, celebrating beasts of burden, the farmer and bullock cart, who represented the ‘real India’ for the late artist.
Nandalal Bose: The folk-inspired Haripura Posters, commissioned by Gandhi in 1938, are a suite of tempera on paper — windows into rural lives, depicting everyone from the potter to the bull wrangler.
Rummana Hussain: The late artist is represented by one of her most significant works, Fragments. It consists of a broken pot or ‘tomb’ — which speaks of loss and silence — laid bare on mirrors to reflect on its ‘post mortem’. The female body, awakening of a womb, the cycle of life, are at play in this work.
Atul Dodiya: Karode chose ‘Broken Branches’ “because it struck a ‘universal chord’ and revolves around the dialogue of violence”. The installation consists of nine wooden cabinets, given a dark, macabre twist: filled with objects that allude to the horror of violence, including the image of Qutbuddin Nasseruddin begging for mercy during the 2001 Gujarat riots, images of babies blinded by the Bhopal gas tragedy and disjointed broken limbs. “What is perhaps sad is that this work of mine is still relevant today, and the violence continues,” he observes.
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