Relics of a vanishing home

Umbartha invites visitors to stand at this ancestral threshold, contemplating the responsibility we inherit and the world we are preparing to leave behind

When a disaster uproots a home, memories and everyday objects become relics of a life that no longer exists. In Umbartha — At an Ancestral Threshold, artist Rohit Varekar transforms this quiet grief into a meditation on memory, ecology and inheritance.

Curated by Priya Pall at Gallerie Nvya in New Delhi, the exhibition reimagines Umbartha as a place where one generation quietly hands over the world to the next — a space of transition that sits neither inside nor outside.

Raised in the ecologically fragile valleys of the Western Ghats, Varekar reflects on a landscape altered by unchecked development. An immersive installation of reclaimed wooden doors is inscribed with environmentalist Madhav Gadgil’s writings, while its interior offers an intimate reflection on childhood memories and nature. Alongside these environmental concerns are sculptures capturing Varekar’s family history: a carved kitchen shelf from his childhood home and a miniature recreation of his ancestral tiled roof. Through carving and layering materials, Varekar excavates memory and preserves the weight of what has been lost.

Umbartha invites visitors to stand at this ancestral threshold, contemplating the responsibility we inherit and the world we are preparing to leave behind.