‘A book can offer more than a single show’
A collection of reflections and images of new work echoes the artist’s concerns about borders
1 Drawing in the Dark is a compendium of your recent work. Why is a book important to an artist? How is it different from an exhibition of your work?
The book is many things and allows for different kinds of encounters. It could be the very first encounter, for audiences who have not seen the works before, or a second encounter, to pause and look at some details which may have been missed out in a physical show. This book includes four bodies of works developed around Bengal Borderlands, which were shown in different venues across several years. So it becomes an encounter with a practice from a particular period. It also includes some earlier works, so links can be formed with the longer journey. A book presents an opportunity to have in-depth texts on the works — here by Sunil Khilnani, Anushka Rajendran and Thomas Theil. The book creates an afterlife for artworks.
2 Could you tell us a little more about how and when you started to think about borders?
I am interested in the relationship any being has to the space outside itself. Growing up as a woman in South Asia, it is impossible to not think about lines which are constantly being drawn around you and the predefined pathways that are nearly pre-navigated for you. Several of my early works looked at notions of the body and even art itself. I went to art school in the year 1992. It was a moment of great enthusiasm, taking a train from the suburbs of Mumbai to the city centre. However, often one would take the train back as the art school was shut. It was a year when the city was gripped by fear post the sectarian riots after the Babri Masjid demolition. It was heartbreaking to see the cosmopolitan dream start to fade. A little after that one started hearing more about “vegetarian” housing complexes. We are surrounded by borders, those drawn on paper and otherwise. With Aar Paar, a public art project which I co-initiated between India and Pakistan, my time in Srinagar, Bengal Borderlands and recent work which looks at attempts to restrain free speech, I am interested in the relationship between an individual and surrounding structures. So borders can be beyond the definition of the nation state.
3 Do you write the texts used in your installations?
While I wrote the text for my light installations, in three bodies of works on Bengal Borderlands, there are extracts from interviews and government documents, and in a couple of instances, a fragment from external material via a book or even a blog. In the 24:00:01 flap board work, while most of the text is by me, the count of flags and symbols of recognised and unrecognised countries comes from literally taking a count.