ART-TRIBUTE:Amar Kanwar,Part II

Amar Kanwar’s work focuses on such issues as nationalism, politics, justice, power, violence and sexual abuse in the Indian subcontinent. His installations are complex narratives connecting personal histories with broader social and political processes, associating legends and ritual objects with present-day symbols and events. Kanwar employs various methods of editing and presentation to exceed their immediate facticity, conjuring atmosphere, underlying motives, and furtive histories (Part I).

By Dimitris Lempesis
Photo: Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza Archive

Amar Kanwar at his solo exhibition at the Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza,  presents two major video installations “The Sovereign Forest” and “The Lightning Testimonies”, whose practice is defined by the gathering of testimony of India’s most vulnerable populations. Both works explore notions of justice and the way it is applied to individual actions, to laws, and to public policies, topics that are especially relevant in today’s climate of fabricated narratives. “The Sovereign Forest” is an ongoing investigative project initiated in 2010 that arises from the conflict in Odisha in eastern India between local communities, the government, and businesses over the control of the land, forests, rivers and minerals, which has resulted in the forced displacement of indigenous communities, farmers and fishermen and generated a climate of violence. Presented as an archive of films, books, photographs and documents, the work provides multiple ways to enter and become immersed in the social, moral, economic, and political issues specific to Odisha yet faced today by many communities across the globe. Developed in collaboration with the activist Sudhir Pattnaik and documentary filmmaker Sherna Dastur, “The Sovereign Forest” opened to the public in 2012 on the Samadrusti campus in Bhubaneswar (Odisha) as a semi-permanent installation. Numerous visitors shared their viewpoints and ideas, in some cases providing further proof and evidence, highlighting that this work is a constantly expanding project. Since then, it has been presented as part of documenta 13 in the Natural History Museum in Kassel; a cement hut in Bhubaneswar (Odisha); a granary on the estate of a ruined colonial mansion in Kochi for the Kochi-Muziris Biennial (Kerala, India); an empty bank building in Sharjah for the Sharjah Biennial (UAE); the Yorkshire Sculpture Park (UK); and TBA21–Augarten in Vienna (AU). “The Lightning Testimonies” is a multi-channel video installation that reflects upon a history of conflict in the Indian subcontinent through the often repressed, always sensitive, and newly urgent subject of sexual violence against women. The work confronts visitors with accounts of victims of wide-scale abduction and rape during the Indian partition in 1947 and the anti-rape demonstrations in Manipur in 2004. As a montage of simultaneous accounts, each projection features a different woman recounting a multi-layered memory of trauma and resilience, revealing multiple submerged narratives, at times through people, images and memories and, at other times, through objects from nature and everyday life that stand in silent witness. As relevant as the day it was conceived, the work transports visitors beyond the realm of suffering into a space of quiet contemplation, where resilience creates the potential for transformation in a world marked by a continued struggle for women’s rights and dignity. “The Lightning Testimonies” remiered at documenta 12 in 2007.

Info: Curator: Chus Martínez, The Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Paseo del Prado 8, Madrid, Duration: 27/2-19/5/19, Days & Hours: Tue-Fri & Sun 10:00-19:00, Sat 10:00-21:00, www.museothyssen.org