Shanthamani M, Arnika Ahldag, Vaishnavi Kambadur
An intimate virtual walkthrough of Past Continuous, MAP’s latest digital exhibition which explores the ever-changing cityscape of Bengaluru in a series of photomontages, by the artist Shanthamani M and curators Arnika Ahldag and Vaishnavi Kambadur.
An opportunity to hear more about the curatorial process and the experience of curating a show on a city, while ironically being stuck inside their homes, this walkthrough will explore the question that really interests them – who is a local. Learn also about the artist’s process, journey and personal narratives of putting this work together.
Past Continuous looks at the geography of the city from the early 2000s, through its fissures and junctions. The exhibition examines people within demographics/spaces, machines, streets, mundane objects, murals, deep lakes and tall trees, abandoned, and asks if the artist is showing us how the city has developed over the years.
Shanthamani M’s work visualises a moment in time, of artists coming together and documenting their surroundings, the people who inhabit neighbourhoods, vanishing skill sets, nature, and the metropolis ever changing. In a way, the work also encourages artists and photographers to work locally at a time when travelling is limited and might be for a long time.
Artist
Shanthamani M lives and works in Bengaluru, India. She completed her graduation and post-graduation in Fine Arts from Mysore and MS University, Baroda before commencing her career as an artist. She has exhibited her works, both solo and in group, in Bangalore, Bombay, London, Miami, New Delhi, Singapore and other cities.
Associate Curator, MAP
Arnika Ahldag is the associate curator at MAP. As an art historian, she investigates the representation of labour in Indian contemporary art. Her curatorial projects include the public programme for IAF 2020 and Mapping Gender: Bodies and Sexualities in the Global South at the Jawaharlal Nehru University. As an artist she works in video and performance and her recent projects were shown at the Bhubaneswar Art Trail, the Kiran Nadar Museum of Modern Art and Max Mueller Bhavan, New Delhi. She co-founded the Feminist Syllabus, which is part of the workshop series Pact of Silence, How to break it, a programme for intersectional feminist discourses in the arts. Over the past years she lectured at the National School of Drama and OP Jindal Global University in New Delhi. She is a PhD candidate at JNU and holds an MA from University College in London, UK and Albert Ludwigs University in Freiburg, Germany.
Assistant Curator, MAP
Vaishnavi Kambadur is the Assistant Curator at MAP. Her research investigates the practice of making cloth and addresses it’s challenges in the context of labour, culture and fashion theory. Vaishnavi has over eight years of experience from working with research archives, retail web stores, garment factories to designing textiles. Her most recent virtual exhibition on hair practices in India was published in VMIS (Virtual Museum of Images and Sounds).
Previously, she held internships at Christie’s and Textile Arts Center, New York, and assisted in teaching courses like history of fashion and fashioning micro-utopias. Vaishnavi holds a MA in Fashion Studies from Parsons School of Design, New York and a Bachelor’s degree in Knitwear Design from the National Institute of Fashion Technology, New Delhi.
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