Let’s meet & talk on 26th August’17 (Conversation with the artists/practitioners at IN-BETWEEN, Korean cultural Centre, Delhi; 26th August, 2017; 3-5 pm)
Epsita Halder, Helen H Kim & Sabrina Osborne presented & discussed different aspects of their practices in the context of their works on display in the exhibition.
About the practitioners
Epsita Halder is Assistant Professor at the Department of Comparative Literature, Jadavpur University in Kolkata, India. In her doctoral thesis, she has explored the different formulations of the battle of Karbala to understand the search for identity of the Bengal Muslims (late nineteenth – early twentieth century). She has been working on the Muharram traditions in West Bengal for last many years. Excerpts & imprints from this durational engagement was put together into ‘When I walk along their sacred lament’ in the exhibition. With this as the backdrop, Epsita discussed about her research methodologies and how the interdisciplinary approach becomes inevitable in her practice.
Helen H Kim has a BFA (Studio Arts) from UCLA (University of California, Los Angles) and pursued Education Abroad Program (Fine Arts) from the University of Leeds, UK. Her work is in-between Korean and American culture (since she was born in Seoul, then immigrated to Los Angeles, USA, when she was seven) but it also disregards the line between “art” and any other activities that people would normally engage in. She throws dinner parties and gatherings that are exploring themes of personal and public space and attempting to engage so-called non-artists in an artistic endeavor. She doesn’t frame these events as art events or use any language that is standard art speak. Her work in the exhibition, ‘K-Town Is My Town’ is an interactive performance in the guise of a walking tour through the Koreatown neighborhood of Los Angeles. Excerpts from that culminated into Go Back to Return Again in the exhibition. People normally don’t engage with the art community, find the art framework disorienting, confusing or intimidating – Helen will be talking about how she tries to address this gap or sense of disorientation, through her practice.
Sabrina Osborne deals with displacement, isolation and melancholia in her practice. She maneuvers to take the viewer on a non-narrative, non-linear, disorientating journey echoing with a cocktail of folk/pop/traditional music from India. Tinted with concerns of identity, memory, loss and belonging, her works are beguiling amalgamations of juxtaposed de-linked images, sounds, spaces and times. Anmol Ghari, the video on display in the exhibition is inspired by the traditional practice of beards worn by young Kwanyama girls as part of their marriage ceremonies; it subtly brings to the fore ideas around gender stereotype.Sabrina did her initial art education BFA & MFA at Delhi College of Art New Delhi, India. She also has a MA Art Practice at Goldsmiths London University. Founder of SAMVAAD, a platform to encourage exchange of international video art, she regularly curates and organizes international video screenings. Sabrina spoke about negotiating diversities in her practice especially in terms of the medium; geographical & cultural set up.
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