Baiju Parthan and Prayas Abhinav
Variable Operatives
THE GUILD
Preview: Tuesday, January 17, 6.30 pm – 8.30 pm
The Guild Art Gallery is delighted to present Variable Operatives, exhibition by Baiju Parthan and Prayas Abhinav previewing on Tuesday 17, 2012
Baiju’s section title: Vector
“Is virtuality an escalation of the real, augmented and exponentially raised to the nth power?
Or is it the antinomic twin gradually and stealthily devouring its sibling… ?
As French theorist Paul Virilio points out “The invention of the ship is also the invention of the shipwreck".
The art works in this show are located at the interstice of the objective real and the ethereal virtual.
The suggested motif - Reality is essentially an epiphenomenon by virtue of it being an interpretation of sensory data filtered through cultural and gender bias,and virtuality the inevitable effervescence a probable dystopian adjunct modifying the real.
These art objects are collision points aimed at presenting the erosion of the implicit 'faith in perception' which is the foundation on which solidity and predictability that we associate with the objective real are built upon.” -Baiju Parthan.
Prayas’ section title: This & this
“Characters in the global pipelines of information-flow are not simple-minded anymore. Multi-faced, holographic personas are now the model. The poetry of this game of smoke and mirrors is performed with a zest shared on all the sides of the fence: the agents and the actors. A few decades back the front-lines of this dance-charade-war had occupied also the world of bits from the world of atoms. The fractal nature of bits co-exists with its plastic shadow. Viewports often que back to the middle of the disarray randomly with disruption in either dimension. Courtship is now a cinematic experience, a kind of biding time for another. A cinema which is performed as much on the screen as in our memory.
These times are like any other and also with our capacity to dream things which we cannot understand, tangents of progression can go anywhere. This is a pattern which is not genetic, it is accidental and algorithmic at the same time. Generative with a history. Perception of patterns and complexities demands history, memory and a computation. This processing is a learnt characteristic for our epoch and species. The instruction line is the instant, the moment where dimensions get compiled into our experience. This is where resistance is; that which resists compilation floats around as an orphan fragment. And these fragments populate the buffer of our psyche with apparitions. What I see is different from what you see.
To unravel the onionskins of these apparitions is where the decay starts. That is when the static sets in. Climbing onto the moving horse, boarding the spinning carousel and getting off at a moment’s distraction... is the rhythm of our waking. A percussionist attempting to read this rhythm into a beat will be constantly listening and calibrating. There is no continuity, only disruption. Meanings are placeholders for eventual substitution. Cognition is meta.
My individual as well as collaborative art works in this exhibition tread in the spaces along these thoughtlines.”- Prayas Abhinav.
There are many ways of deciphering the present experience. And some ways of not having to. Of letting layers of unprocessed information build up and explode into some dimension of lucidity. There are two approaches for dealing with perceptual drift in this exhibition. Questions not easily answered, and questions not asked often enough as they inspire the delirium of division by zero. An impossibility.
The prevailing conditions of art requires the vocalization of intent in a way that demands itself to be treated as a singular reality. Besides being a paradox, this is often a too heavy a burden to carry. To escalate a crescendo and then to climb down... as a part of the same performance, is a balancing act.
Perception is trained by illusions. Agreements, negotiations, deals happen between faculties to establish the most basic ways of looking at the world. When this deal-making is challenged in the most radical ways, we experience things that we cherish. In this game, playing by the rules is not playing at all. Not that there are any rules to speak of, really. Every time the smoke clears and the dust settles there is a re-calibration happening.
We are talking of scales which do not have any markings. Scales which are not imposed but are discovered to be existing. The discovery of each such scale is either becoming a part of a weave we call truth or adding to the violence and disarray of our confusion. That is the pendulum we must swing on.
Baiju Parthan
Born in Kerala in 1956, Baiju Parthan has an eclectic academic background. Along with degrees in Painting, Botany, Philosophy, and a Post-grad diploma in Comparative mythology, he has done studies in computer game level design at the Pratt Institute Manhattan USA. Baiju Parthan is an inter-media artist, working simultaneously with the traditional media of painting as well as digital technology based installation art. He is one of the early exponents of new media art and mediatic-realism in the Indian contemporary art scene. Essentially, his work is about world views or cosmographies that are on collision course affecting and transforming each other, and the resulting ontological fallout felt and lived by us all.He has done his BSC in Botany, studied painting from 1978-83 at the art school in Goa and he has a Master’s degree in Comparative Mythology at Bombay University. Some of his prominent shows include 'Constructed Realities', curated by Gayatri Sinha at The Guild, Mumbai, 2010 'Go See India', part of India-Sweden Cultural Exchange Program presented by Emami Chisel, Kolkata at Aakriti Art Gallery, Kolkata; Vasa Konsthal and Gallery-Scandinavia,Gothenburg; 'The Intuitive: Logic Revisted', from the Osians Collection at The World Economic Forum, Davos, Switzerland; 'Looking Glass: The Existence of Difference', Twenty Indian Contemporary Artists presented by Religare Arts Initiative, New Delhi in collaboration with American Centre; British Council; Goethe-Institut/ Max Mueller Bhavan, New Delhi; 'The 11th Hour: An Exhibition of Contemporary Art from India / Diaspora', Tang Contemporary, Beijing.Parthan;s recent new media installations include Arpeggio for Abbe Faria,- Photography Installation, Benedictine Museum, Fecamp, France; Rorschach Breath Dual channel video, Anant Gallery, N.Delhi, Bombay Art Gallery, Mumbai, India; Liquid memory new media Installation- Christian Hosp Galleries, Nassereith, Austria.His recent solo sahows are 'Dislocation: Milljunction Part 2', Aicon Gallery, London; 'Milljunction: Paintings and Photo-Works by Baiju Parthan', Aicon Gallery, New York, Liquid memory + Rant - Inter-media show Vadehra Gallery New Delhi.
Prayas Abhinav
Artist, Faculty at the Srishti School of Art, Design and Technology, Center for Experimental Media Arts (CEMA). Prayas Abhinav lives in Bangalore, India. Presently he teaches at the Srishti School of Art, Design and Technology and is a researcher at the Center for Experimental Media Arts (CEMA). He has taught in the past at Dutch Art Institute (DAI) and Center for Environmental Planning and Technology (CEPT). He has been supported by fellowships by Sarai/CSDS (2005), Openspace India (2009), TED (2009) and Center for Media Studies (CMS) (2006). He has presented his projects and proposals in the last few years at Periferry, Guwahati (2010), Exit Art, New York (2010), Futuresonic, Manchester (2009), Wintercamp, Amsterdam (2009), 48c: Public Art Ecology (2008), Khoj (2008), Urban Climate Camp, ISEA (2008), Sensory Urbanism, Glasgow (2008), First Monday, Chicago (2006), The Paris Accord (2006) and PSBT/Prasar Bharti (2006). He has also participated in the exhibitions Myth ←u8594 Reality (2011) at The Guild, Mumbai, Continuum Transfunctioner (2010) at exhibit 320 in Delhi, Contested Space - Incursions (2010) at Gallery Seven Arts in Delhi and Astonishment of Being (2009) at the Birla Academy of Art and Culture in Kolkatta.
In July 2011, he curated a residency and exhibition project on time called, "On the Sidereal" at The Guild (Mumbai).
Until February 29.
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