Echoes of Ephemera: Party is Elsewhere

If a thing of beauty is a joy forever, as English poet John Keats would have us believe, then what is to be made of a show that highlights decrepitude? Is its job to remind us of the ephemeral nature of life and everything in it? That the value of the grotesque and the repulsive is in its mere existence, as it allows pretty perfection to stand out further? Or, alternatively, does the unpleasantness itself hold value as a much-needed contrast to whitewashed ideals? These are some of the questions that come to mind upon browsing through ‘Party is Elsewhere’, a multi-artist showcase which took place in February this year as an India Art Fair Parallel offering. 

Sharp Objects: The Last Rust by Archana Hande

On Unequal Burdens: Waste and Toxicity in Navjot Altaf’s New Works

The collective title of the paintings, Waste Archive as Landscape, suggests they are meant to be archives. If so, they are archives that are out of reach, whose contents cannot be discerned. Perhaps this effect is a reference to the impact of the limitless cycles of production of products that humans cannot entirely grasp or catalogue. On the contrary, those who live on the edges of landfills, both humans and nonhuman living beings, suffer the consequences viscerally.

Amphibian Aesthetics: Lens to Hyphenated Identity

Not a celebratory idea of nature’s unique benevolence, i.e., the amphibian, but a nudge to the human tribe to recognise and acknowledge the abyss of apocalypses it has entailed in the face of unchecked urban development. The hyphenated identity of an amphibian, which can live on land as well as in water, within the realm of the exhibition, epitomises the catastrophe humans have waged on the Earth, only to break its existence rooted in harmony with nature. To mention, Amphibian Aesthetics marks the first exhibition presented at Ishara House, initiated by the Ishara Art Foundation in Dubai. The exhibition, alongside the Kochi Muziris Biennale, is organised in partnership with Aazhi Archives: a collective of artists, writers, scholars and researchers engaged in collaborative studies of Kerala’s maritime past and its changing artistic cultures.

Mapping a Memory

Arpita Singh, A Feminine Tale, 1995. Copyright: Arpita-Singh, Image Credit: Justin Piperge. A distinctly chalky pink predominates Arpita Singh’s canvases. Sometimes it appears in wreaths of flowers blooming in unbeckoned corners of the canvas, or in candy-floss-like clouds dotted over a bustling Delhi.

Sujata Bajaj on the cosmos to explore infinity of deep space

A sky full of twinkling stars is perhaps one of the earliest fascinations of human race. It is not difficult to imagine the first men, women, and children—who appeared approximately 3 million years ago—looking up in wonder with the setting of the sun and beginning to see guiding lights in the sky.

Where Archives Breathe: Self-Narration and Oceanic Memory in AUTOPOIESIS

The exhibition stages a structural intervention within a region long shaped by layered violences and oceanic crossings, treating the body as a relational field. Mahbubani, whose great-grandparents were forced to migrate from Sindh following Partition, places her own body within this terrain.

A Symbol of Rebuilding, Renewal and Reimagining: Chobi Mela Returns

The South Asian country of Bangladesh is in the throes of political change. In July 2024, commonly called the July Revolution, a student, Gen Z-led, pro-democracy mass movement resulted in ousting Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.

The Evolution of a Woman: Dhruvi Acharya

A Return to the Elements