Seventeen artistes from six nations will comment on a range of issues like gender inequality, racial discrimination and understanding of the human body during the East West Art Festival, Shrabasti Mallik reports
A girl calmly peeps into her laptop while a sturdy man covers her with a shawl from behind. In the next frame, she is already loaded with layers of shawls. The photographs are a work of Afghani artiste Hanifa Alizada who has made a strong commentary on her country’s society. “They want an educated girl who can manage household chores after marriage. This picture depict that mindset. The girl can be modern but she will have to succumb to daily tasks,” she says.
Alizada’s photographs are drawn from her experiences as a refugee in Iran. Her solo show titled Before Our Own Eyes to be held at the NIV Art Centre is part of the East West Art Festival, which will be held in four different art centres in the city. The festival, organised by The Creative Community in collaboration with the NIV Art Centre, will begin from March 19 and continue till April 12 with a participation of 17 artistes from six countries.
Hanifa’s body of work deals with social issues with focus on discrimination on the grounds of gender, class and ethnicity. “In my previous works I have dealt with issues of human rights and gender inequality,” says the artiste whose first series titled The Girl Who Has learnt is a moving collection of photographs showing the different colours of relationships in society. “One collection of work which is closer to my heart is of an identity. There I have captured only the faces of people which have a price tag. It was the reflection of the society I lived in where people were discriminated — a place where people indirectly put a price on fellow humans on the basis of nationality, colour and economic class. Through my art I want to question a social system where standard is a conditioned priority, where any gap or diverging opinion is stigmatised if not suppressed,” she adds.
If Hanifa’s works deal with society and tradition, French artiste Enora lalet’s taste lies in food, quite literally. The artiste’s choices of subjects for her photographs are a mix of the human body and food. She calls it her trans-disciplinary body of work, where she uses the body, particularly the face, as the base. “I want to create an oneiric universe that is why I combine dance with the world of painting and gastronomy. The result is dreamlike and almost real,” says the artiste whose works will be featured in a group show at the NIV Art Centre as a part of the festival.
While photographs and installations will be a visual delight, South Korean artiste Narae Jin’s art project will be interactive. Her solo show titled Dramascope to be held at the Korean Cultural Centre will be an installation on mixed media. “There will be a big table with many pieces of paper with different written texts over them. Visitors can use material and make a story of their own. It will be a participative exhibition and the theme will be about craftsmen,” she explains. At the end of the exhibition she plans to make a small booklet from all the stories that she will collect from the people.
Japanese artist Ema Kawanago and Indian photographer Koustav Nag explore the Asian society in an analogous way of expression. Their exhibition Mind The Gap to be held at Japan Foundation is an attempt to cross their practice and to present the result of their collaboration. “I have developed my artistic practice on an anthropological models — how to link situations, how to take a stand and to operate in the environment,” says Ema. The festival is not just restricted to photographs and installations. There will also be performing art by Bangalore-based artiste Deepak Kukri Shivaswami who will depict how the same activity is performed differently by a man and a woman. “I call it the political body. It is the captivity of the urban bodies and how we react and deal with conflicts which are both internal and external. I take images and forms from popular cultures and incorporate the movements in my choreography,” said the dancer whose show will see him dancing on the stage with the projection of a dancing girl on the background.
The festival will also feature Monkey Birds, a street artist duo from Paris. Their forte lies in fusing image of a monkey and a bird in their graffiti. Through their art louis Boiden and Edward Egea strive to find a common dialect and they choose animals to speak about humans. “A monkey and a bird is a paradox because monkeys are notorious creatures, full of mischief while birds are calm. Interestingly there are no monkeys in France but in our graffiti, both monkeys and birds become media of our expressions,” said louis.