Books / Stores

Yesterday we did a day trip to SOBO (South Bombay) to select books for SEA Library. We browsed about 500 books to select relevant stuff for the library. Amongst these were authors that we know, dont know, have met, despise, abhor. What caught my attention was two of them - one, a book by my advisor, Eeva Liisa Pelkonen - "Achtung Architecture" which she wrote as a part of her MED Thesis in 1994 at Yale. I never imagined it would be easy to find her book, like many others, in India, more specifically in a book store in Mumbai! The appearance of people whom you know in unforeseen places brings unique pleasure, memories and delight.

Another one was an essay by Keller Easterling, one of my professors again, at Yale in a book completely unimagined! While Keller is quite famous, and notable, I always find her writing intriguing, for she has the capacity to comment on any subject so cleverly. Sometimes I feel I must write to them, for we were so closely interacting with them at Yale all the time. I don't think I necessarily valued these academics as much when we were there. Perhaps personhood is much less glamorous than ideas. Ideas are larger than life, they live longer, and have a greater impact. When these ideas are emitted by their creators themselves in person, they somehow don't sound as fantastic! I am not beginning to thing if it is the human agency that grounds these ideas? These ideas - referring us to the "ideal" perhaps become human in the words of their creators. It's interesting to think of our impressions about ideas and people through each other! The producers of ideas seem larger than themselves when seen through their ideas (ofcourse those whom we eulogize). Ideas seem so small when them come from their own producers.

In either case, ideas seem to lie outside the human, just using people as an agency to formulate themselves.

After browsing so many books, I was almost fatigued. There was a point after which my brain couldn't process anything! Yet, it is wonderful to be surrounded by books. I enjoy the way in which they are put together, and interact with the human body in their physicality.

From floating archives

On Waiting

Mumbai, like many cities can brutally delay you, or keep you waiting for someone. Waiting frustrates, angers and annoys. Often, people think of waiting as killing time. In order that one is in better control of emotions, it is best to make peace with and find strategies to tackle the stretched time of waiting. The notion of "killing" time, and the   negative connotation it carries is a problem of capitalistic thinking. We are often not sure of or not prepared about what to do in this unwanted, undecided period of unsure length. Most of us cannot come up with anything creative to fill up this void...this leads to the feeling of unproductiveness, worthlessness and waste.

Ofcourse, all these feelings are legitimate. I am talking of a scenario when you are waiting free of meeting a deadline to catch a cinema show, reach a meeting or go for an event. These moments are ofcourse frustrating because there's something at stake - sometimes monetarily, sometimes intellectually, sometimes commitment wise.  But when the purpose is just to wait, should we be equally frustrated?

Dreamers and wanderers perhaps may love waiting. Edgar Allen Poe in one of his pieces describes of waiting at a coffee shop just looking at people passing by, when later he follows a stranger cutting across the city, thus deciphering a new city. But here, Poe is merely waiting for thoughts to occur to him. His wait is not for a real physical person. If although, people were considered to be thoughts that float to you, could the experience of waiting be less frustrating?

People like the ones mentioned above may find such pockets of time and weird geographic settings inspiring for constructing thoughts. This doesn't guarantee that the real geography might be apparent in the works produced in such moments. New awkward geographies suspend dreamers in unimagined thought pools. These thought pools emerge out of an un-orchestrated chemistry of events and actors - phenomena quite opposite to what they employ in their work. The reflection on and in such new environments may give rise to interesting readings.

Although the realisation of the  temporal existence of the "waiter" or the person waiting in these new geographies may bring these readings to the limit of boredom. If long waits end well, the worth of wait is appreciated. However if waiting ends in futility, it can lead to loss of faith in the person and the very act of waiting. Waiting may not necessarily be physically comfortable, it may be exhausting. Extended waits may tire you physically, leading you to an irritable mood to enjoy the moment you were actually meant to meet for. A tired body cannot enjoy the happiest of moments. Such a contradictory experience of waiting constructs frustration.

The experience of slippage of time is different in different places. Cities might accentuate the feeling of loss of time. Relatively, waiting in smaller, slower places for even shorter time may give an illusion of a long wait. However, more often than not, it's about the mental preparedness to waiting. If you have already considered that you might need to wait, looking at the overall factors neutrally - including weather, traffic, nature of the person, etc., you will be able to negotiate the frustration that comes with it. If you find yourself waiting really unexpectedly and for long, you really need to make up the decision of the worth of wait. We will make mistakes - but over time, get better at dealing with the feeling of crisis that comes with waiting.

Checklist of a Concsious Viewer

Source: Manifesta 11 Catalogue.
http://m11.manifesta.org/en/about/publications


Published by Lars Müller Publishers
Available at Manifesta 11 main venues and Lars Müller Publishers. Distributed worldwide.
Bilingual edition: German, English
Softcover: 21 x 26 cm; 320 pages
Retail price: CHF 49
ISBN: 978-3-03778-488-4

Notes on Understanding the "Post Colonial"

SNDT Campus Mumbai - Charles Correa

I just realised that there is no image of the lovely SNDT Campus anywhere on the internet that was designed by Charles Correa! I pulled out these images from my ages old archive when the Cinema City Exhibition was hosted here. These are randomly taken images that catch glimpses of the campus. 

The Politics of Curation

Yesterday in an intense discussion with Aditya (Sawant) and Deepti (Talpade), we came to question the constitution of the position of a Curator. Aditya's argument was that the act of curation was a self-legitimised enactment of power. He questioned where, after all, does the curator derive validation for the works he selects to be a part of any exhibition. Who testifies his knowledge and how does it gain currency?

To be sure, his observation sat well within a Marxist framework. In the increasingly capitalising art world, curators are often appointed on the basis of their potential to bring sufficient funds for / to any project. In this situation, the power of the curator is constituted in the role of administering and managing money that mobilises the exhibition activity.

Aditya went on to say that a specific framing of any event by a curator fundamentally starts shifting the nature in which the artist himself/herself sees one's own work. Thus, it impacts the true nature of the evolution of an artist, giving in to a relationship that has been established between the organiser (curator) and the producer (artist).

Dipti however expanded to say that every position, in that notion would be an enactment of power. At the same time, there would be many curatorial acts which donot necessarily fall merely within the logic of economics. While many of these network relationships have come to feed into the present structure of several art events, there are scenarios in which curators do not necessarily impact the producer's work.

We debated a lot on the role of the curator, and the underpinnings of executing art exhibitions today. Much of it seemed like intellectual masturbation. But thinking back, I just thought it might be worthwhile to put down the arguments for a future date.

Three words of confuse and concern

Didactic: Intended to teach, particularly in having moral instruction as an ulterior motif.

Pedantic: Excessively concerned with minor details or rules, too instructional

Pedagogic: Relating to teaching.

Word Affinities sourced from:

http://visuwords.com/

The Advancement of Learning

"The registering and proposing of doubts has a double use: one use is a straightforward use - it guides us against errors. The second use involves the role of doubts in initiating a process of enquiry which has the effect of enriching our investigations."

-Francis Bacon, The Advancement of Learning, 1605

More Reflections / AD Jury at SEA