ODE TO NOTHINGNESS
Sudarshan Shetty’s latest exhibition, Shoonya Ghar, is a bundle of contradictions. It’s made from visibly aged material. But it’s a brand new work. As you enter, the central installation appears to be a palatial structure. But you soon find your way into
“There is an essential need for all of us to map our own past in order to make sense of our present,” the 55- yearold artist explains on a recent afternoon, as he supervises a team of craftsmen who put the final touches on the exhibition— his first in Mumbai in seven years. “All of it is a representation, but can it extend into our existence? Where do we draw the line and what is our interior and exterior world?”
Inspired by Shunya gadh, a rhyming couplet by 12th century poet Gorakhnath, the show explores the dual concepts of abundance and nothingness. Showing at Mumbai’s Dr Bhau Daji Lad Museum until December 26, the exhibition comprises four works. Most impressive is a central architectural structure made from second- hand wood sourced from various parts of India including
Chor Bazaar in Mumbai and Ahmedabad.
Other works include a dome reminiscent of the Mughal period, a wooden granary like those used in Kerala and a series of columns that give the impression of a Roman ruin.
The main structure is a magnificent work, raves Tasneem Mehta, managing trustee and honorary director of the museum. “Each piece of wood used in this installation was part of an older structure,” she says. “That has such a sense of resonance, poetry and an archaeological impact too. It’s like a circle of life because Sudarshan has infused a new lease of life in these used objects.”
To explain his inspiration, Shetty recites the couplet, called a doha, that lies at the heart of the exhibition.
“Shunya gadh shahar, shahar ghar basti, kon sota kon jage hai ( Who is asleep and who is awake in this city, this home, this settlement, and this fortress of nothingness)?”
Shetty found the couplet’s aesthetic strategy appealing. It evokes many architectural images, only to say it’s all empty. “It creates enormous space for speculation and gave me the idea of
Shoonya Ghar,” he says.
He first built the works at his studio and residence in Chembur, as the set for a video he was scripting on the themes of love, life,
An indoor show so far, in Mumbai, it’s being held outside
laughter, anger and death. He and his craftsmen then dismantled them and rebuilt them at an abandoned quarry to film the video.
“There is a cavity in the mountain on the road to Lona vala created by stone being taken away to build something else, so there was a symbolic gesture of rebuilding the str uctures [ there],” he says. Intrigued by the location, Shetty incorporated footage of the craftsmen building the works with the scenes he’d scripted for the actors to make an hour- long film that’s now part of the exhibition. “The installation was built as a set while I was writing a script for the video. So, in a way the film dictated it,” Shetty says.
First unveiled at the National Gallery of Modern Art in New Delhi last year, the exhibition has until this showing been displayed indoors. Shetty believes this gives it a new connotation and changes the viewer’s experience dramatically. “Earlier, it was shown within architectural spaces, so it was an imposition on those places,” he says. In an outdoor space like at the one at the Dr Bhau Daji Lad Museum, “it seems like an object that may have be- longed here. I have always been fascinated about how we look at an object within a museum space. We are taught to understand that the idea of museumisation refers to the place that it comes from. But I don’t think it’s true. Its meaning changes every time you look at it through the perception of people.”
Terming Shoonya Ghar as an ongoing, constantly evolving project, Shetty says working on it has been challenging. “It took us around 18 months to build it. The structure is designed such that it has to be dismantled and put back together each time it is exhibited. There are so many pieces of wood that sometimes they get lost in transit. In such a scenario, I have to find similar objects. So that again plays with the idea of representation.”
The other artistic challenge was to build something that seemed distant in time. “The structure looks old, removed from contemporary times. The film too has an objective distance from the subject as there are no close- ups. So, it’s creating a distance with time as well as the events that happened in another time and space,” he explains.