Body as Medium of Expression
LATE INTO THE NIGHT, amidst the embers of the dying bonfire in the abandoned grounds in Morni Hills, he constantly talks about the full moon and what its surrealistic light can do. Asymmetrical shadows move around us. He notices them and smiles.
It is 3 am when we enter the shared room at Healing Hills Art Residency (Morni Hills, Panchkula) where he was invited in October to deliver a series of lectures. Delhi-based Performance artist Inder Salim decides to look into the mirror. He does that from different angles and says he can see many people suddenly. He is in no mood to answer questions. “Let us talk about smells of ghosts - that would be interesting.”
Performance Artist Inder Salim is convinced that his genre of art is bound to find more takers among the young as nothing ‘resists’ like the body does
With 55-year-old Salim, nothing is linear, everything is found/unfound in the multiple layers that engulf his art – precisely why he is India’s most well known face in his chosen field. “But I am learning everyday. More importantly, listening to youngsters and deciphering their angst,” says the Kashmir-born Salim, who has been a performance artist for over 25 years now.
“It was in the late 90s that I thought of experimenting with the body as a medium for expression. This discipline was divorced from acting and did not involve any investment – that was the beginning, and there were just few of us like Sushil Kumar and the late Shantanu Lodh,” he recalls. Admitting that the earlier idea of doing body specific art has undergone radical changes all over the world, the artist says that in contemporary times, the ‘purpose’ of this art form is to understand ‘who am I’ within the toxicity of our times.
A Sarai Independent Fellow (200607), Salim, who has performed at major venues internationally, insists that intimate settings bring out the best in him. “The attention span of a smaller group and lack of distraction makes it much wiser if I can use that word in the insane times we live in.”
Talk to him about performance art yet to gain widespread acceptance in art schools and conventional art institutions, and Salim says, “Let us not forget that people who are interested in art are just beginning to understand this medium. Frankly, I feel that even the familiar art genres, mediums and styles are struggling in the Indian art scenario. Performance art as genre among genres is new but it does carry a primordial echo to make a veritable transaction.”
Salim completed the first two of several short movies based on writer Manto’s story
Dogs Of Tithwal in collaboration with Turkish artist Alper Solaris and Swiss artist Pascel Lampert respectively this year. He says that the Healing Hill Art Space, set up by Chandigarh-based artist Harpreet Singh in Morni Hills (Haryana) to invite international Performance artists will encourage young artists from the region towards this medium. “It is a transformative and meditative exercise in the mountains which Singh has set up with his own money. This model in definitely going to generate more interest in this form of art and people are bound to be attracted by the International Performance Biennale slated to be held here in November.”
Lamenting that the present government at the centre has done little for any art form, Salim feels that considering the fact that art is primarily about 'resistance ' and it is unlikely that the government will promote it.
Dawn decides to march towards the hills. Salim looks outside. “Another day, let’s sleep now,” he says.