Curated by Deeksha Nath, "Retellings" brings together two artists – New York-based Pritika Chowdhry and Delhi-based Baaraan Ijlal – who, despite differences in medium and theme, are bound together by the notion of “play”. Chowdhry’s two series “The Shadow Lines” and “The Crooked Lines” employ kites and a Pachisi board game, while Ijlal’s paintings under “Stitched Wings” and “To Be Continued” are inspired by the Indian circus and the oral story-telling tradition of the Arabian Nights.

The works in “The Shadow Lines” (possibly borrowed from Amitav Ghosh’s novel of the same name, which deals with the problematic idea of national boundaries and identity), comprise maps drawn and stitched onto kites made of a variety of material - handmade flax paper, animal gut skin, and abaca paper. The maps do not show names of cities or countries; rather, they contain border terminology such as “line of control”, “cease fire line” and “border post.” Rough surgical sutures attempt to mend some torn kites. The irony is self-evident and extremely powerful - the freedom and playfulness that a kite represents juxtaposed with artificial, manmade boundaries, often the site of violent and vicious battles for control of power.

This idea of play and politics spills over into Chowdhry’s “The Crooked Lines” - a Pachisi board game where the artist has replaced the original interchangeable game panels with ones that are printed with actual border fragments of various nations, including India, Pakistan, Palestine, Israel, Korea and Germany among others. The metaphor is poignant - national borders are often “played” with by governments.

While Chowdhry’s work presents the viewers with an array of contemporary problems, Ijlal’s paintings and installations seem to offer a subtle, gentle solution. The idea of open dialogue is an important theme in “To Be Continued”, a series of fabulously vibrant acrylic paintings, which show spaces of gathering. One of her untitled works shows a group of women seemingly stitching a quilt of stories and surrounded by shadows and miniatures of characters from their tales. Another painting has a woman superimposed with a tree of stories in a modern café, complete with a Route 66 signboard and blackboard menu. Another untitled work, with a wash of muted blue, shows five burkha-clad women, with one wearing clothing that is beautifully coloured and detailed. Around them are wild animals and soldiers - objects of danger that perhaps threaten the continuity of their stories. In her artist note, Ijlal says “the dialogue should never cease. Like Sheherzade’s narrative, it has to continue to keep humanity going.”

Inspired by a circus that used to camp near her home in Bhopal when she was a child, “Stitched Wings” also deals with stories, the ones people sometimes carry around in secret. One of the paintings shows a finely detailed building with many floors and windows, each telling a different story - one shows a woman combing her hair, another a blindfolded man. This is then superimposed by a large image of a tight-rope walker. Even more startling is a painting that shows an aerial view of a moving truck in which circus people are travelling. The vehicle is much bigger than the others on the road to stress the larger than life, even magical, nature of the profession. The crowd of people, interspersed by animals and circus equipment, are woven together almost like a quilt of overlapping stories.

More unusual, however, is Ijlal’s “House of Commons” series which employ miniature cupboards as a canvas, each painted inside and out with a variety of characters and animals. The idea is that visitors step up and “open” the cupboards to see the stories that they hold - it transforms the private into a public space, making the experience voyeuristic as well as playful. The artist’s instructions on the gallery walls say “Third parties' please approach DIRECTLY.”

While the exhibition is unusual and engaging, you’d probably be left wishing there was more on show by both the artists. Yet that can only be a good thing.