Das supliment 2016

Guide to the

February 5-8, 2016

This painting by Dhaka-based artist Farzana ahmed urmi is a part of the Samdani art award exhibition.

Urmi’s canvases are full of human stories. This figurative work complimented by abstraction is from her “Lines in Mood” series, which shows mental dysphoria and self-denial.

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EditorZafar Sobhan

Magazine EditorRumana Habib

Assistant Magazine EditorSabah Rahman

Magazine Team:Promiti ChowdhurySN RasulSyeda Samira SadequeSaqib Sarker

PhotographersRajib Dhar Mehedi Hasan

Graphics:Mahbub AlamAlamgir HossainTahsin Momin

Colour Specialist:Shekhar Mondal

Advertisement:Shahin AhsanMamitur RahmanMofazzal Hoque

ProductionMasum Billah

CirculationMasud Kabir Pavel

Websitewww.dhakatribune.com/tags/Dhaka Art Summitfacebook.com/DhakaTribune/

FRIDAY, FebRuARY 5, 2016

8 Maps & Schedule - Everything you need to know to navigate DAS

9 Solo Projects - Floors G, 1 & 2

Commissioned specifically for DAS, 17 artists create experiential art in the form of installation, mixed media and performance pieces. 10 The Missing One - Floor 1

The art is arranged in three broad movements, united by the visual metaphor of looking up at the sky, and inspired by a Bengali sci-fi story and a Tagore painting.

11 Mining Warm Data - Floor 1 Sculpture, installation, film and photography that examine how an individual’s profile is defined subjectively, beyond cold clinical methods and statistical analyses.

14 architecture in bangladesh - Floor 2 A study of the influence of the late architect Muzharul Islam on the local work of 19 architects and firms.

15 rewind – Floor 2

A historical exhibition showcasing 12 artists from across South Asia before the late 1980s, illuminating “transnational modernism.”

16 Performance art - Floor 2 Eight continuous live performances from artists across the region relates to the idea of everything being in a state of becoming or flux.

17 Samdani art award - Floor 2

Showcasing 13 of the the promising young Bangladeshi artists

20 Soul Searching - Floor 3 50 paintings by 50 Bangladeshi artists tell the story of the quest for self-identity in a new nation.

First & Third Floor21 Films & Programmes - Floor 1 & 3

Scheduled offerings throughout all 4 days of the summit include film screenings, lectures, Critical Writing Ensemble workshops, and book launches.

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Welcome to the Dhaka Tribune’s Guide to the Dhaka Art Summit.

This guide contains everything you need to know to navigate the “world’s largest South Asia art event,” a four day art extravaganza at the National Art Gallery at Shilpakala Academy.

We invite you to use this guide as a walkthrough, as it is organised floor-by-floor and room-by-room. We’ve included maps, artist info, and insights from artists and scholars of each exhibit, in order to maximise the quality of your experience.

Contained herein are also plenty of beautiful pictures of arresting artwork, and we hope you will keep

it as a souvenir of this unique and unforgettable event.

The Dhaka Art Summit is brought to you by Co-Founder Nadia Samdani, the president of the Samdani Art Foundation, and Chief Curator Diana Campbell Betancourt, the foundation’s artistic director. This is the third edition of the biannual event, and with each outing it expands in vision and scope.

You can look forward to a brilliant selection of a diverse range of work by nearly 300 leading artists from the region, put together by some of the finest curators from renowned institutions like the MoMA, the Tate Modern, and Centre Pompidou.

There are also film screenings,

installations, performances, retrospectives, architecture exhibits, panel discussions, live radio broadcasts, children’s workshops,

DAS also serves as a cultural exchange for local artists, providing a platform connect to the international market. Bangladeshi work is prominently showcased, and many young artists have made DAS a launching pad for successful international careers.

Come see what everyone has been raving about!

– Rumana Habib

ps Check out Dhaka Tribune for our extensive daily coverage of the event.

Editor’s note

Seventeen solo projects have been specially commissioned for the dhaka art Summit.

The works are mostly new and they break away from the traditional understanding of rationality. curator diana Betancourt thinks that “curating exhibitions about identity is a minefield,” but it is nevertheless very important to explore the questions and trying to find out “how individuals see their place in the world.”

These artists come from diverse backgrounds. among them, four are from Bangladesh, four are from Indian, three from the uK, two from Myanmar, two from the uS, one from Singapore, and one from pakistan.

lynda Benglis whose work has sold for $1M, is South asian by association, as she is an american

artist who spent decades living in India.

The 17 projects make use of different mediums to present ideas and thoughts. Tino Sehgal presents ann lee, developed from a Japanese manga video game character, who is brought to life, and must relate with the real world. prabhavathi Meppayil confronts the viewers with a sculptural work that plays off of the architecture of Bangladesh Shilpakala academy itself.

Many of these works make quite profound and radical statements, which may not be kindly received if presented plainly without the artistic interpretation of reality, such as Shumon ahmed’s critique on torture.

What these look like is difficult to describe in words. They need to be experienced in person. n

Singular experiencesOnly at Dhaka Art Summit: Custom installations and performances offer viewers one-of-a-kind experiencesSaqib Sarker

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SOlO pROJecTS DiANA CAMpbell betANCourtchIeF cuRaTOR, daS

in ipso Facto, burmese artists tun Win Aung & Wah Nu (Myanmar) take the viewers for a walk through a canvas forest, for an eerie reminder that this experience might soon cease to exist thanks to climate change.

Mustafa Zaman’s lost Memory eternalised is an unauthorised retelling of the past that provides a myriad of lenses to the viewer through which to view history or historical figures.

Haroon Mirza’s the National Apavilion of then and Now features a triangular room lined with black foam pyramids. light and sound seem to disappear. Following a period of total darkness, a halo of of white leD lights get progressively brighter, along with a buzzing sound, until both abruptly stop.

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This exhibit is inspired by one of the first Bengali science fiction stories of the same name, and

showcases the work of more than 20 artists across the region, including Ronni ahmmed, Neha choksi and Saskia pintelon. They interpreted the theme of looking toward the sky.

three movements The exhibition is arranged in three broad movements, represented on the walls of the exhibition by deepening shades of blue. The first

movement “Staring up at the sky” is about enchantment, and takes the Tagore painting as a formal point of departure. The second movement “alienation,” is about the complex feelings that can be evoked be contemplating our place in the universe. The third movement “light Blindness” is about dystopia and the possibility of redemption.

It follows, in some loose sense, the plot of a generic science fiction novel or film – first a happy, innocent world; which is then interrupted by the hostile appearance of a foreign or extra-

terrestrial being; and finally, at the climax, an apocalyptic threat emerges with the potential for salvation through faith and human will.

bengal renaissanceThe name of the exhibition comes from Nirrudesher Kahani or “The Story of The Missing One,” written in 1896 by Jagadish chandra Bose. It is considered to be one of the first tales in the sci-fi genre written in Bengali. Bose, a pioneering inventor of instruments for wireless technology and the study of nature, was close to the Tagore family, who were the central figures in what is known as the Bengal Renaissance.

It would have been against this backdrop that Gaganendranath Tagore painted Resurrection, which is the other inspiration for this exhibit. It is an ethereal painting, with a circular vortex of clouds with a religious icon at the centre, as if the viewer is staring up at the heavens. “I was really struck by this work because it made me ask why? Why is he painting this religious theme in this extremely futuristic way? Modernity, religion, rationality and faith are often perceived as a dichotomy these days, especially here, especially now,” said curator Nada Raza.n

Blue skies, somber thoughts Contemporary art meets spirituality and Bengali sci-fiNasr Dastgir and Syeda Samira Sadeque

Poetry Trail - Feb 6 six local poets selected through the British council’s MuseMasters Performance Poetry competition, who will hold individual performances within the exhibition, drawing inspiration from the work featured here.

2pm - 2:30pm | shazed Ul Hoq Khan Abir and syeda samira sadeque4pm - 4:30pm | sarwat sameen and sayeeda tahera Ahmad7pm - 7:30pm | sadaat Ruhul and sM Jarif

The MISSING ONeS NADA rAZAaSSISTaNT cuRaTOR, TaTe MOdeRN

Neha Choksi picks up the infinite variations of sky blue. These are cyanograms, referring to early scientific experiments with light and

representation. Based on a photograph of the landing of a ‘space ball’ or junk from decaying spacecraft and satellites, pressure Sphere Recovered in South africa 2001-2002 is a drawing from choksi’s series Space debris.

pHoto: Neha choksi, Skyfold 8, 2013

MOVeMeNT 1Staring up at the sky

Mehreen Murtaza investigates concepts such as authenticity

and objectivity, challenging the division between the

realms of memory and experience. her work

addresses the forcefully forgotten legacy of dr abdus Salam, the first pakistani to

win a Nobel prize in physics. dr Salam, despite being an icon of pride for the nation, was forgotten over time due

to his identity of an ahmadiya Muslim, a persecuted minority

in current day pakistan.

pHoto: Mehreen Murtaza, comet Bennet over delhi,

humayun’s Tomb March 1970

MOVeMeNT 2Alienation

Firoze Mahmud experiments with a wide range of media

and materials to address contemporary concerns. his

roles shift and conspire between artist as activist engaging within

the politics of a nation in flux. In these images, he creates

cyborg-like images out of regular Bangladeshi families by placing

eyeglasses made out of everyday materials. The final image is

absurd yet showing hope as the subjects stare upwards at the sky.

pHoto: Firoz Mahmud, Soaked dream and Future Families

MOVeMeNT 3light blindness

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This exhibition will feature works that have roots in the South asian region including Bangladesh,

Sri lanka, pakistan, Myanmar, India, Nepal and Tibet. In this age of globalization, when most information is represented through statistics and numbers, this exhibition will portray information – profiles – beyond the traditional and critical methods.

“The exhibition will look at the role of fantasy and subjectivity in creating a profile of a person, beyond the traditional and clinical methods applied by statistical

analyses, government data agencies, economic interests, community interests, or even dictatorial censorship,” curator diana Betancourt said.

While the next door exhibition, The Missing One, looks to the sky for answers, this emotional exhibition requires delving into the dark crevices of the contemporary human condition, which is expected to help the audience interpret multiple meanings.

“Warm bodies, cold bodies, and metamorphic bodies transitioning between these states challenge the viewer in this exhibition.

It seeks to give agency to the spectator’s imagination rather than reduce the artworks to their often disturbing and sometimes political implications. In the spirit of this agency,” said diana.

“I leave the viewer with the words of artists, rather than my own, as non-forensic cues to rethink what we consider evidence and the importance of fiction as we consider,” she said.

One of the interesting pieces in this exhibition is the Ghana versus Getty exhibition by Maryam Jafri, who juxtaposes stories behind photos provided by Getty Images

as well as the Ghanian government. Jafri was inspired to do this when she recently found several photos of Ghanian Independence day on Getty Images, with their copyright over these photos. upon checking data with both sources, it turned out that facts and details weren’t consistent.

“Getty vs Ghana takes the overlapping images in both image banks and posits them not to speculate on the past but to tap into contemporary concerns about copyright, digitization, and the foreign ownership of national heritage,” Jafri says on her website. n

Don’t you know who I am?South Asian artists grapple with official markers of identity versus the subjective experience of the self Syeda Samira Sadeque

MINING WaRM daTaDiANA CAMpbell betANCourtchIeF cuRaTOR, daS

Hasan elahiIn this age of state paranoia post-9/11 america, elahi leaped into an era of self-surveillance. his work depicts a collage of 32,000 photos that he sent to the FBI during that time period.

Hitman GurungGurung uses art to address the issue of migration from Nepal, which has increased exponentially since the civil war, and has left a generational gap that affects a sense of community.

lida Abdul abdul, an afghani who has lived as a refugee in Germany and India, uses performance art to scream out her story – except, the scream is silent. In Speaking and hearing (1999-2001), her mouth opens to depict stories of what she’s lost in the conflict in afghanistan.

NortseNortse uses mixed-media works, using traditional Tibetan imagery, to address issues such as global warming, environmental degradation, over-population, alcoholism, the erosion of culture and tradition, and the desire to establish one’s own identity in a world of mass media.

To find a common cultural identityThe legacy of Mazharul Islam on the architects of BangladeshPromiti Prova Chowdhury

tALK: Architecture in BangladeshFebruary 7 at 4:30-5:30pm3rd floor auditorium

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aRchITecTuRe AurelieN leMoNiercuRaTOR OF aRchITecTuRe aT The ceNTRe pOMpIdOu, paRIS

Rafiq Azam’s work focuses mainly on collective housing or individual residences and explores the dialogue between architecture, geography and the natural elements surrounding their environment.

SA Residence, Gulshan, Dhaka

In the current era of globalisation, the primary challenge of architecture in Bangladesh is to find a common cultural identity. This exhibition, “The legacy of Mazharul Islam,” pays tribute to the late architect (1923-2012) responsible for inviting louis Kahn to create Bangladesh’s parliament building. he had a great influence on other architects of the nation.

This exhibition is a journey through modern and contemporary Bangladeshi architecture, showcasing 3d models, blueprints, sketches and photos, some signature works, as well as videos of the architects presenting their projects.

The participating architects are: Bashirul haq. Shamsul Wares Raziul ahsan, Saif ul haque, Jalal ahmad, uttam Kumar Saha Nahas ahmed Khalil, Rafiq azam, ehsan Khan, Nurur Rahman Khan Mustapha Khalid palash enamul Karim Nirjhar, Kashef Mahboob chowdhury Marina Tabassum, Salauddin ahmed and Stephane paumier.

“From Independence, Muzharul Islam singlehandedly innovated a modernist language in his buildings,” said Bangladeshi architect Kazi Khaleed ashraf in an interview with the curator.

“he tried to establish ... a norm for a modern culture in architecture, which is about discourse and investigation, rational practices and finally being aware of the contribution of architects in society,” said ashraf, who is the current director general of Bengal Institute of architecture, landscapes and Settlements in dhaka.

“he did not copy any kind of elements from tradition,” added ashraf. “he was strongly devoted to the spirit of the place, its political history, and its cultural legacy.”

Regarding dhaka’s architecture, ashraf said: “It is not enough to note what is wrong in our city, the traffic, social inequality, lack of public facilities. We know these. The challenge is elsewhere. To me it is how a city like dhaka is going to be reorganised with the landscape.” n

This exhitibition is a unique opportunity to view and experience art history and historic arts. The project assembles works from public and private collections in europe, South and Southeast asia, and the united States that chart the diverse manifestations of abstraction in pre-1980s South asia.

on displayRewind features more than 90 works by 13 artists associated with Bangladesh, Burma, India, pakistan, and Sri lanka. These are abstract depictions by notable artists.

The exhibition explores how three generations of artists have

responded to shifting cultural, political, and social contexts with experiments in abstraction, or the relationship between representation and abstraction — even when some of their primary practices are or were firmly rooted in figuration.

time machineThe majority of the works on view were produced between the late 1940s and the late 1970s, a period that witnessed the Independence of India and pakistan from Britain and the devastating partition of the subcontinent, followed by several major conflicts including the liberation War of Bangladesh.

Border crossingA journey through South Asian art, post-Partition and pre-IndependenceSaqib Sarker

Safiuddin ahmed (Bangladesh)Zahoor ul akhlaq (pakistan)Rashid choudhury (Bangladesh)Monika correa (India)Germaine Krull (Myanmar)Nalini Malani (India)akbar padamsee (India)Krishna Reddy (India)anwar Jalal Shemza (pakistan)

arpita Singh (India)Bagyi aung Soe (Myanmar)SM Sultan (Bangladesh)lionel Wendt (Sri lanka)

advised by asia art archive Senior Researcher Sabih AhmedRewind is generously supported by Amrita Jhaveri

Participating Artists

The extreme political and social upheaval of that time created impressions on these artists that could not possibly have escaped the work done at that time. With that perception or presumption, the artworks are now unique pieces of history that are extraordinary windows into the past.

transcending bordersThe unique voices and visions of these artists enable the spectators to see through borders and get a sense of the role that modernity played in

our collective consciousness. “From the pared-down

calligraphic scrawls of aung Soe, Shemza, and Singh; and the distillations of natural and human form undertaken by Reddy, ahmed, Sultan, and Krull; to the experiments with light, pattern, and flatness of choudhury, Malani, padamsee; the works in Rewind embody some of the ways in which modernism has played out within and beyond the region,” the curators said. n

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ReWINdBeTh cITRON, cuRaTOR, MOdeRN aNd cONTeMpORaRy aRT, RuBIN MuSeuMaMaRa aNTIlla, aSSISTaNT cuRaTOR, SOlOMON R GuGGeNheIM MuSeuMdIaNa caMpBell BeTaNcOuRT, chIeF cuRaTOR, daS

Rashid Choudhury, Adam, Courtesy of the Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy

Safiuddin Ahmed, In Memory of 71

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peRFORMaNce paVIllION

For the uninitiated, performance art can seem like a strange experience, and that is often the goal. An artist might venture

into performance art as a way to explore different forms of expression, to reach out to people, and tread into a completely new territory, using their bodies as the crucial instrument to get their particular messages across.

Performance art is a non-traditional artform that combines visual art with dramatic performance, poetry, music, dance, or painting. Performance may be either scripted or unscripted, random or carefully orchestrated, spontaneous or otherwise carefully planned, with or without audience participation.

Shifting Sands, Sifting Hands is a continuously running exhibition at the Performance Pavilion of the Dhaka Art Summit. It relates to the idea of everything being in a state of becoming or flux, especially the human body, where movement and change are with us from the moment of birth until death. This exhibition aims to reapproach the current critiques surrounding performance art within both the institution and in an object orientated art world.

Stop by and engage all five senses at the pavillion, which will be open to all everyday from 10am-9pm.

Ali Asgar (Dhaka, bangladesh), inside the Zone, outside your ConscienceAli will create an interactive “non-gender biased area/gender free zone” wherein audiences can transform the artist’s appearance using the installed gender-objectified props, or by sending him instant text messages with performance recommendations.

His objective is to help people understand their assumptions of gender stereotyping based on social codes of dress and attire.

Sanad Kumar biswas (Dhaka, bangladesh), me & MeEncased in a plastic bag, Biswas will use his own breath to survive. Using the translucent walls of the ballooned bag as a surface, he will make notations and records using a marker to write and draw his visceral experience of “being/existing” in the bag.

“This is an un-deciphered endless poem ... made of taste, smell, touch, and feelings,” said Sanad. “I am seeking another me, who is gradually metamorphosing in endless ways.”

Kabir Ahmed Masum Chisty (Dhaka, bangladesh), Dialogue NegotiationIn the persona of a sportsman, Chisty will play tennis with his reflection in the mirror. He uses the sport and the idea of playing with his own image

as a metaphor for the alienation postmodern technologies have created.

“Technology cannot exist without the biological body, so why then are we competing with our virtual body?” he asks.

Manmeet Devgun (New Delhi, india) tiMe HAS A StArt AND AN eND-Do i belieVe tHAt NotioN?Devgun will use matchsticks to construct words, and words to construct sentences, which will snake through the various spaces of the Dhaka Art Summit. “I will devise a note on ‘time’… to understand time/duration/memories with certain situations and incidents in my life,” Devgun says.

Her work has consistently questioned the role imposed on women in a predominantly patriarchal world.

Sajan Mani (Kochi, india), #Makeinindia Mani will perform an “act of resistance through a black Dalit body to draw attention to historical and current injustice.”

He will carry the bodies of Dalit grandfathers who were used as cows beasts of burden in the fields and killed. The performance is part of a larger body of work where Mani is looking at the cow and its relationship to food, religion, and politics.

Yasmin Jahan Nupur (Dhaka, bangladesh), Another Crazy thing i can Do; Dance!Nupur will move in “dance,” ie in non-dance motions and movements imitating dance. In doing so, she will deal with the body, mind, and the various emotional states that she will pass through during her performance.

Nupur says the focus of her work is “the joy of creating, and not being afraid of creating, the willingness to do something, having an idea, and doing it, without being overly analytical.”

Venuri perera (Colombo, Sri lanka), entry/No entry 1.2Different types of passports have varying degrees of power. “The inequality and undignified processes and rituals many have to face before and during entering another country are addressed in this durational performance installation consisting of a series of short, individual, intimate encounters,” says Venuri, a dancer known for challenging political and social issues.

Atish Saha (Dhaka, bangladesh), Memories of my Mother’s WombAtish will spend 53 hours confined to an 8x8ft box. For the entire duration, “I will wait and wait in different corners of the box; I will be sitting, lying, staring at the ceiling” said Saha, a maker of images, working between photography and performance. l

Class acts at the DASSabah Rahman

Bodywork, Nikhil Chopra, Bangladesh CouRteSy: SAMdANI ARt FouNdAtIoN

NiKHil CHoprA, MADHAVi Gore AND JANA prepeluH

The Samdani art award is a crucial part of the dhaka art Summit. Fresh local talent from the artist community

between the ages of 20-40 are selected and featured in an exhibit at the summit.

What the winner gains is quite the prize, to say the least – a three month residency at the delphina Foundation, an independent, non-profit foundation dedicated to facilitating artistic exchange and developing creative practice through residencies, partnerships and public programming.

The collection on display at this exhibition showcases singular examples in painting, printmaking, film, photography, performances and sculptures. you can expect a reflection of developing, local contemporary art.

Narrowed down from 300 applicants, curator daniel Baumann, was asked to pick only 10 candidates, but ended up insisting on 13, as he was positively overwhelmed by the

high quality of the work. When choosing the shortlist, the

curator said looked for individuals who had something to say and the courage and conviction to develop and use a language of their own. his advice to emerging artists is to organise themselves by delving into the history and languages of art without feeling intimidated by both.

“Being an artist is a tough thing, but I don’t know of any other place where there is as much space for freedom,” Baumann told the dhaka Tribune.

“New wealth has been created in many parts of the world, including South asia. The Western art market is most probably overrated, so people are looking for new territories to invest. This may sound a bit cynical, but it is probably true. I do believe that more and more people realize that there is more interesting art than those coming from paris, Berlin, london, and New york. We live in a rich world, so let’s expand our horizons!” n

Samdani Art AwardsSpotlight on the up-and-coming artists of BangladeshSabah Rahman

Ashit Mitra Where there is No title: a series of etchings that express the hidden resilience of the spirit of life.

Atish SahaWater: portraits of people in the water of the Buriganga River.

Farzana Ahmed urmilines in Mood: a series that represents self-denial and mental dysphoria.

Gazi Nafis Ahmedinner Face: photographs based on “the collective denial about sexual diversity in Bangladesh.”

Muhammad rafiqul islam ShuvoCommunal Aliention and Faster

Satiation, but only for Nevertheless behavior: photographs that reflect random situations with dramatic sound and pauses, creating a curious aftermath.

palash battacharjeeFilter: Video installation work inspired by daily life events which are used in a repetitive way to re-emphasise the meaning of our mundane acts.

rasel Chowdhuryrailway longings: a contemplative approach to the railroad.

Salma Abedin prithiDear love: a monologue of ordinary people who express thoughts about their intimate relationships with families and loved ones on camera.

Shumon AhmedWhen Dead Ships travel: From the Metal Graves photographic series, a journey through one of the world’s largest ship graveyards in chittagong, Bangladesh.

Shimul Saharebirth: exploring the metaphor for the two lives the artist lived, in this world and in his mother’s womb.

Zihan KarimHabitat: Film projections that hope to create a dialogue between the real and the virtual.

Samsul Alam Helalopen Stage: an ongoing series of work that engages the people from the “Sweeper colony” from Old dhaka.

Participating artists

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SaMdaNI aRT aWaRdSDANiel bAuMANNdIRecTOR OF The KuNSThalle, ZuRIch

Photo: AtISh SAhA

Photo: SAMSul AlAM helAl

every artistic piece, be it painting, literature or film, can be considered an attempt of the creator to reach his roots. In line with that practice, 50 pieces by 50 Bangladeshi artists are being presented in this exhibition.

Soul Searching aims to look into the roots of the modern era of Bangladeshi art, which sprang from the influence of Shilpacharya Zainul abedin, SM Sultan, Qamrul hassan and Safiuddin ahmed. To discover their own identity within a newly formed nation, they eventually relied on the cultural and environmental heritage of Bangladesh.

“The river is my master,” Shilpacharya Zainul abedin famously said, and he always identified the river of Brahmaputra as the muse of his artistic exploration. after many explorations across South asia and the globe, he mastered his artistic identity by returning to nature – back to the riverbank where he was born.

even as the urban entity grew prominent in contemporary Bangladesh, the artists of that generation sought their own identity through the local vernacular, be it urban or rural.

The work exhibited will portray elements like soil, nature and different aspects of the nation. Most of the work is done with oil and acrylics.

“each of the paintings has a language. however, the interpretation depends on the spectator, how they choose to analyse it,” Md Muniruzzaman, the curator of the exhibition, told the dhaka Tribune.

Muniruzzaman said he believes these prominent artists created something new in order to reach back to their past, be it culture, country or one’s existence. however, every artist tries to bring out their best on the canvas, but only a few of them can become immortal, he opined.

The exhibition incorporates both the internationally acclaimed legends as well as the subsequent generation of artists who learned from them.

This collection will allow viewers to see how these influences directly or indirectly affected the next generation of artists.n

The river is my masterBangladeshi painters in their quest for identityPromiti Prova Chowdhury

Sheikh afzalJamal ahmedKazi Salahuddin ahmed Shahabuddin ahmed Najma akhterabul Barq alviRashid amin anisuzzamanatia Islam anneMurtaja BaseerGolam Faruque Bebul Kanak chanpa chakma Samarjit Roy chowdhury Ranjit das

chandra Shekhar dey Mohammad eunusTarun GhoshBishwajit Goswami Mahmudul haque Mustafizul haqueNaima haqueGulshan hossainNisar hossain Mohammad Iqbal Monirul IslamSyed JahangirFareha JebaTejosh halder Josh Saidul haque Juis Shahid KabirKalidas Karmakar hashem Khan

hamiduzzaman Khan hasan Mahmuddhali al Mamoon Nazlee laila Mansur Khalid Mahmud Mithu Rafiqun Nabiahmed NazirMaksuda Iqbal Nipa Imran hossain piplu KMa Quayyum Wakilur Rahmandilruba latif Rosy Shyamal chandra Sarkar abdus Shakoor Shah ahmed Shamsuddoha Biren ShomeRokeya SultanaFarida Zaman

Participating artists

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SOul SeaRchING MD MuNiruZZAMANeXecuTIVe dIRecTOR, GalleRy chITRaK

Madonna - Nizar hossain

Sheikh Afzal-Childhood Memory

Self Analysis - Ranjit das Photos: Mehedi hasan

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PassagesThe South Asian experience on the silver screenPromiti Prova Chowdhury

The film programme aims to give the spectators an exploration of certain colonial and postcolonial conditions, like belonging, differences, exile, and displacement – all parts of the regions, history and present day reality. But of course, with a resolutely transnational perspective, in the words of Shanay Jhaveri, the curator of the film programme at the dhaka art Summit.

The line up includes films with a literal understanding and consideration of travel. One that might focus exclusively on works made by travelling artists and consequently devotes a section to those films that relate the journeys made by objects across differing contexts and scenarios.

For example, it pairs chris Marker and alain Resnais’s Statues also die

(1953) that reflects on african tribal objects that have been gathered by ethnographic museums in the West, with Bahman Kiarostami’s The Treasure cave (2009), where the story of the Museum of contemporary art in Tehran and its comprehensive collection of modern western art is told.

On the other hand, it also makes room for work like lisl ponger’s phantom Foreign Vienna (2004) in

which ponger does not leave Vienna, but films over 70 different cultures and nations, simply by visiting different neighbourhoods in the city. Through ponger’s film Vienna becomes global, so to speak.

It also projects landscapes that hold emotions, particularly those scarred by violence in a cluster of films that comprises Mani Kaul’s rarely seen but stunning film on Kashmir Before My eyes (1989), Soon

Mi yoo’s dangerous Supplement (2005) assembled from found footage shot by american soldiers during the Korean war.

In a nutshell, the film programme consciously eschews a regional focus, and presents films from across the world, hoping to manifest as an expansive constellation of shared affinities and empathies, but one where each work still retains its own specificity. n

SuppleMeNTaRy pROGRaMMeS

FIlM pROGRaMMeSSHANAY JHAVeriaSSISTaNT cuRaTOR, SOuTh aSIa, MOdeRN aNd cONTeMpORaRy aRT

Asia Art Archive an ongoing project that maps the rich history of 20th century art writing across the different languages of South asia. It will host its first live Feed Station on-site as daS, where visitors can find a host of publications, art magazines, books, and catalogues.

Safina Radio ProjectBringing together the discussions of belonging and home, the Safina Radio project will broadcast conversations and performance pieces created with the artists, writers and curators of the dhaka art Summit for the duration of the summit, documenting their experiences in the city. check out their booth on the third floor, or tune in at safinaradioproject.org.

VAST BhutanVaST Bhutan, a children’s NGO in Bhutan, will bring the the pressing issue of climate change to the attention of the youth by holding a workshop on the last two days of the Summit. On Sunday and Monday, the NGO will work with dhaka’s youth to make an immersive installation from waste products. They will place a specific focus on aquatic life and fish, a dietary staple of the country as well as a central element in the Bengali identity.

Critical Writing Ensemble Bringing together peers from South asia and across the globe to share writing histories and knowledge with each other, experiment together, and produce new critical impulses regarding art writing. cWe will conduct 4 sessions from February 3-8.

Floor 3

Ayisha Abrahim, I Saw A God dance

VASt Bhutan

Sarker Protik, Work in Progress

Das supliment 2016

Documents

Transcript of Das supliment 2016