Body/Nobody: Reflections by the Artist on Her Work

Co-sponsors: University of Michigan Museum of Art; Penny W. Stamps School of Art & Design; History of Art

Abstract: Through this talk, I want to discuss about the other kinds of bodies in my work- metaphysical, physical, emotional and subconscious. I will try to draw a narrative of my art practice. My art practice has been primarily read through the morbid and humorous representation of human and non-human, organic and inorganic bodies.

It will be an insight into my works through my words. Through this talk I want to evade all the stereotypes that have come to be associated with me; for I feel that change is essential and indispensable in making a body of art wholesome.

I would like to look at ‘feminism’ through the narrative of my work, which is not central to one specific gender, rather takes a more humane approach to appreciate life, emotions and feelings and not only through the lens of acute eroticism and sexuality in my art practice.

Further I would like to explore the idea of language as it has evolved in my language over the years. Coming from a Bengali background and struggling with a more socially accepted “metropolitan” language like English I have come to use the unconscious and non-structured aspect of our consciousness in order to deal with this marginality. For me marginality is not only socio-political and cultural. It is also of our inner voices and emotions that we have come to ignore or forget under cultural pressure. This marginality resides in our body and our body resides on those margins.

In a way, the narrative strewn through this talk will reflect the merging/fading of physical body into an abstract ‘nothingness’ in my works: a nothingness which is intangible but with a presence of its own.

For more details.

April 11, 4:00 PM, Room 1636 School of Social Work Building

This program is organized by the Center for South Asian Studies with support from the U-M LSA Theme Semester and co-sponsored by the University of Michigan Museum of Art, the Penny W. Stamps School of Art & Design, and History of Art.