| India is changing rapidly; the India in which I grew up had a vastly different array of visual imagery then that of the India we know in the year 2009, a relatively short period for substantial change, imagery that perhaps defined us to a certain extent, all of which are fast fading into nostalgic memories. I can still remember people, objects, tools and utensils present during the years that I was growing up in kolkata and Mumbai, all archaic and misplaced for any society in the world, but they were more then just that, they were also our statement of independence, an economy that was closed and trying to figure it self out, a bygone era where value addition was not the norm but an economical, functional necessity.
I have in this series of paintings tried to capture some of this visual imagery, perhaps in an attempt to document an era fast being forgotten. I have included a grid as an overlay to all these images, as I feel India has been suddenly quantified by the rest of the world and we are now a numerical value rather then a country with so much history and culture which could be of great significance to the rest of the world. I have also introduced modern day symbology of a foetus, a strand of DNA and also a barcode as I wanted to depict what a new generation of Indians feel about our loss of identity (feotus) the Dna Strand and the barcode was a way of showing how the human race and its unabashed race for materialism is having an adverse effect on our culture, it was also significant to me how the dna looked very much like a skewed barcode. |
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