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Home > Art >  Privacy is an art

18th May 2012

Images courtesy of Experimenter

Privacy is an art

by Janice Pariat

Given that everyone reading this probably has a Facebook account, it would be safe to assume that we are all aware of how the notion of "privacy" has transformed over the past decade. From being something tangible and physical – privacy within one's home or room, for instance – it has moved, with the advent of the Internet, to cyber space, where information is available on virtually anyone or anything at the click of a mouse button or a millisecond search on Google. "Say Everything", the current show at Experimenter Gallery, brings together five contemporary Indian artists who attempt to understand - and question - the need for privacy in a broad social and personal context.

 The most striking of the works is "Cut Copy Paste", a laser-cut mirror installation by Delhi-based Pushkar Thakur. This larger than life piece is a giant replication of a computer keyboard pasted on a wall. It echoes intricate Rajasthani mirror work, yet also serves as a poignant reminder of the fragmented nature of our "online" lives - be it information about ourselves that we choose to share with others, or what we gather about them. The installation also throws up questions about different versions of reality that are created online, about identities that are patched together through "cutting, copying and pasting".

Perfectly capturing the protean nature of our online personalities is Sukanya Ghosh's collage video titled "Flicker". Borrowing its name from the popular image sharing website, this work explores the notion of "access" through the recurring backdrop image of a door opening and closing interspersed with pictures of the human eye. The organ serves as a point of entry for the information we choose to see. Her other work, "Privacy Code" is a video projection on a galvanized iron sheet, which she used, according to her artist note, to subvert the notion of "high" or complex technology. This base machine, however, can still be used to read or project the mantra "Visibility: Invisible", and serves as a comment on how we choose to hide or reveal our online selves and identities.

Mumbai-based Baptist Coelho explores a more old-fashioned notion of privacy that is just as pertinent especially, in this case, for urban dwellers. The consequences of unplanned development in cities have forced people to renegotiate public and private spaces; often, the two overlap. "Neighbour" consists in a series of "windows" looking out into various urban landscapes - a towering abandoned building, a congested block of flats with tiny balconies, a single window with a flower pot on the sill - and echoes, oddly enough, the paranoia and voyeuristic suspense of Hitchcock's "Rear Window".

The sculptural works of Shreyas Karle, "Pregnant space" and "Inside-Out", use abstract forms to question a broader notion of privacy. The various body parts on display - head, feet, hands – created with plaster of Paris and painted a skin-brown tone, represent a physical fragmentation of our selves.

Amidst the installation and mixed media work, Sajad Malik's graphic drawings, though brilliant, seem a little out of place. Malik, a Srinagar-based artist, is well known for his comic strips and graphic novels that employ humour, satire and irony to comment on the turbulent political and social atmosphere in Jammu and Kashmir. His work, "Facebooked" takes a look at how "social networking groups are used to register protest as well as to impose oppressive ideologies" - especially pertinent now, as Facebook was recently banned for a short while in Pakistan in response to the creation of a group called "Everybody draw Muhammad Day". The sheets however, filled with Malik's characteristic detailed graphic style, beg to be bound into a book and flipped by fingers rather than hung stoically on the wall.

 

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Experimenter
2/1 Hindustan Road, Kolkata
Monday – Saturday, 11am – 8pm
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Janice Pariat is a freelance writer currently based in her hometown Shillong after many years away in Delhi and elsewhere. She edits Pyrta, a journal of poetry, prose, photo essays and sketches. You can read more of her work on her blog

 

 
 
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