Press Release

In asking the question “Who do you think I am ?”, we open a paragraph on what unites indiivuals in a multicultural diaspora. One does not seek to define any political or the social citizenship but rather to explore the intimate space between the artists and the viewer where both can share a personal experience, offer a different perspective to this continuous quest of belonging and identity. In a hierarchy it is simpler to form a concept of self, given our duties, powers and boundaries. Technological change, cohesion and friction of capitalism, commercialization and faster travel has now created a new set of symbols, language and the individual. I, the non resident is at once the citizen and the stranger.

The subject of self is vast. The moment we ask for an identity we are seeking both a similarity, a sense of kinship or belonging as well as the singular, the redeeming feature, or “all things counter, original, spare, strange”- GM Hopkins. It may touch the issues of evolution of identity from colonial to post colonial, from modern to post modern. Documenta, Magiciens de la Terre, Iconoclash, Africa Remix have progressively analysed this in much greater depth and over multi-disciplines. The current and new permutations of the global systems bring new complexes that one may have to review at a later stage. In the last 30 years the world has seen at least 40 million foreign workers, 20 million refugees, 25 million internally displaced people due to famines & intra-community violence. Today the world is constantly re –adjusting to this transitional reality under unprecedented economic, security and environmental pressure. With such a vast canvas, working on an all inclusive awareness of race, gender, aesthetic orientation, generation and location will require many excursions that will surely happen. On this occasion one has sought to think beyond the initial subjectivities of minority and focus on the articulation of personal subjectivities that unite cultures. This exhibition is a selection of eight artists from a wide interaction with about three dozen who responded to the title question.

Samuel Fosso : (world wise and now famous, photographer, lives in Bangui).
Born Cameroonian, having escaped civil war in Nigeria to settle a studio in Republic of Central Africa, Samuel has documented his youth, the contemporary global society and geopolitics always through a studio auto portrait. From the series of portraits shot in Paris, for apparel retailer Tati, as African chief (cover of Africa remix catalogue, Hayward Gallery 2005), the liberated woman of the seventies, the sailor, etc have become iconic images of the post colonial identity movement. Already part of permanent collections of the Studio Museum, the Moma, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, Musuem of Fine Arts Houston, the Princeton Museum and the Calcografica in Italy, Samuel continues to review the contemporary role models from his perspective. The privacy offered by the studio shot in which he uses quite saturated colors of lately allows him to provide controlled statement. Personal beauty or grace being also part of the Ibo psychology, he has captured a fresh angle on the individual’s desire for recognition and shades of narcissism.

Hiran Mitra (youthful Indian painter & writer, lives in Calcutta) : He revels in the symbolism of the inner self versus outer structures. As an abstract artist in Art community that continued to seek traditional and figurative forms, the artists has studied the influence of Film, Music and behaviour of Color to define various human emotions. He finds the human condition exalts in the twilight zones of reality and time, offering a precious introspective escape route. Blackness for him is a positive and defintive state from which one can start creating. He will be exhibiting shortly in Solo at the Great Art Fair in London (Nov 30- Dec 3, 2006,) and also having a solo show of his works on Paper with a catalogue in March 2007. Quite well recognized in India, his has recently been received by a strong group of collectors and critics in France.

Costea de la Reghin (young Roumanian wizard, lives in Paris) :The narrative of the Roumanian tradition brings back the human condition to age old paradigms and stories. Costea delves through the layers of the tones and forms into his mythical past. Using acrylic and papier mache, paints often a story of a couple, where the woman has betrayed her husband and the mundane brown daily life for a lover who dominates her thoughts but does not stay. Or as the three Graces show that are lives as united in a primary relation of self, the alter-ego and the public.

Naila Shishiny : (enthousiastic Egyptian, delegate of the UNCHR, paints & lives in Rio de Janeiro): After travelling through many countries, Naila found home again in Rio de Janeiro in 1975. Between paintings, she works for the UNHCR in resettling political refugees, from Haiti, Western Sahara, Algeria, Iraq, under precarious political and security conditions. She observes populations in immense difficulties and global organizations trying meet those needs insufficiently but relentlessly. Her paintings touch the core of the life conditions, the emptiness, the interrogations that she sees in the people she meets. Delicate, feminine and melancholy she continues to seek an element of hope and tenderness through her paintings.

Kirann Telkar : (young, anticonsumerism activist living in Mumbai) : Our individuality seeks to resist the role models thrown at us every day in the mass media and protect that private space without falling out with the peer groups. Kirann Telkar faced with this dilemma is questioning the capacity of the advertising and marketing world to nurture the anxieties, and then give ready made solutions as the Coca Cola bottles become the multitudes of identical individuals. The floundering self in the background remains in nearly lost suspension. In using a school bench and recycled plastic bottles in “Staple” he explores the future of the individual and coming generations in the personification of the new mankind. Kirann is preparing his next exhibition of large paintings in the Mumbai General Post Office and also his new life experience of being a young father.

Mehraneh Atashi (young, curious photographer, lives in Tehran)
Her fears of war and a deep yearning for the simplicity of childhood predominates any identification or cultural considerations. If there is a difficulty in being questioned how any global citizen has lived and should live today due to mis-amalgamation of history and economic desires, it is not impossible for the global citizen today to suggest a different reality, a different path to progression. Through repeated excursions Mehraneh is reminding us that we need to able to remember the basic values, the curiosity, the seeking mind and the peace that childhood once promised us or if necessary recreate the nostalgic self to protect the core human values. There is a spatial and temporal poetry in her images where her feet step back into time and over the figments of the past. There is a lateral point that she draws the public eye to whereby we are looking at the horizontal line of vision as if when we are lying down on a field or stretcher. She lives and works in Teheran and does her own printing. She is currently exploring new ideas in Sri Lanka.

Shalina Vichitra (painter and young trekker, lives in Delhi)Modern existence has pulled us into a abstraction of values, views and displacement from traditional communities and structures. Geographic displacement, and probably war which changes our physical/ mental boundaries of accepted space is something Shalina has explored through her amazing imaginary map work. She carries the viewer to a new territory, her own with limited reference to personal space or country. A young mother and artist she has embraced a sense of liberty in her forms and compositions.

Tapas Konar (painter and passionate old records collector, lives in Calcutta) uses the primal lines of rural symbolism and figures to represent his inner most identification. While he frees himself from the communal prejudices his paintings often reflect the different states in which the individuals find them selves, half reality and half dream like characters interwined with the familiar mythological characters such as a red Krishna (“A Jump into Red”) and “Traveller”. He captures the desire of societies to render the deities, gods and even Modern day Avatars into a likelihood of our daily personalities, in the different ages of man. Nearly monochromatic he creates a subtle drama around the central figure who by his regard and his gestures in not alone.

About ART BORDER LINE :
Art Border Line, is a UK based organization promoting living well known and emerging artists of multi-cultural roots with a universal thinking in the fields of painting, photography and sculpture. We seek to collaborate with galleries, museums, art councils and art consultants on behalf of the artists as well as showcasing new works through organized events. A complete view of the artists’ works can be found in the private gallery on www.artborderline.com

PRESS RELEASE : Who Do you Think I am ?
3rd – 16th Sep
The Gallery in Cork Street
28 Cork Street, W1S 3NG ,London