This article is based on the interviews that were conducted
as part of the documentation process for R.A.P.E (regional art performance event)
Guwahati 2012, a fortnight of events with interconnecting junctures in form of performances,
installations, workshops, paper presentations, and group interactions.
The premise of this article is to present viewpoints as expressed
by various artists regarding their performances during the event.
Performance for me is just like photography, painting or
video it just another medium to express myself and my past experiences.
Manmeet devgun
It is an act where I am involved with myself and conscious
only about myself, where the choreography becomes spontaneous and honest
Anuradha upadhyaya
I am concerned with the idea of “body is an element”, to
experiment with how to explore my body in context of performance, as sight
specific using the limited resources. For me the performance starts by
recording the moments and things around be whether they are conversation,
environment around or other mundane stuff. My act starts while the other activities
are still happening around me. So I believe in the accident.
We are surrounded by frustrations and problems but no one
actually talks about how to solve the problems. Thus for me tying and choking myself
is a process of relieving, I can’t even express the peace of mind I get after
the performances. For me it’s a cleansing process, it is easy to talk about the
problems but being a sensitive human being and being an artist we have to find
solutions too. For me binding is a frustrated act, if I am not able to find out
the solution to issues, disturbances, frustrations that keep piling up inside me,
around me, every day.
The objects that I use are representation of collective
discussions or symbols of society and my step by step interventions or act is a
cleansing process, I relieve myself of the frustration at every point during
the performance.
Each and every act or performance of binding is different
with different concerns and problems that may be pilling inside me till that moment,
so each act becomes a life altering process making me feel relaxed
Pratul dash
Through performance the idea can directly be taken to the
public
Aniruddha baruah-The Yellow Cab Group
My thought is to create interaction, curiosity and social
conciseness amongst common people. What I like is when people come to the
performance and I am able to study their face, everyone has a different
expression and reaction.
Kishor Kumar Das – Artist’s Guild
Even in my paintings the human body parts which are very
abstract and organic are frequently used. I explore this sensuality through
touch, an act which has a very intimate connection for me a performance was a
way of connecting my private experience within a public domain, while
questioning certain social stigmas which restrict women from engaging in
certain tasks
Dharitri Boro
It is not very different for me to be an artist – generally
- then a painter and a performer. Some where I have taken a decision that my
work is in the field of visual arts so I try to construct designs, visuals and
visual experiences, sometimes on paper and sometimes with spaces, not just two
dimensional spaces but also 3dimentional real spaces. My intention is always the
same as when I am working as a painter or when I am working as a performance
artist.
I try to create a sort of an expression - a communication or
a visual - more directly to say a visual experience to communicate within myself
and I think if that process is reflected it communicates with the audience as
well.
There is a difference, when I am working within my studio my
space, private or personal space, and when I am working in the public I am
working with the other with people around.
That is what I like about public art, that I can reflect or
share my labor- the process of labor, the process of the work which you can’t
always reflect in the painting or in a sculpture.
I don’t think of my work from the subject or content point
of view because the content, subject, visuals, or motifs come intuitively.
I try to relate with what I am thinking, I try to keep
myself engaged with it, so that when I try to relate the thoughts with my art I
can share that labor in public spaces. This sharing of labor is, I could say,
interesting and important. It’s this physicality of doing which reflects the
feeling of labor.
Syed Taufik Riaz
For us as a group performance comes from personal
experiences and trying to find and provide solutions to our personal
experiences, even if it is temporary. The act is not for the public it was for ourselves.
As a group for us Performance starts with the idea and then its development
takes place.
Dharamendra Prasad – Anga Studio
I work with the non linear theater - for me nothing is fixed
and permanent. I use disposable material and all the materials that I use are
originally used for some other purpose. But when I use these materials I give
them different meaning which is lost after very performance, leaving the
material to regain its own identity later.
I don’t stick to one original idea or the concept of the
installation, performance or public art- whatever that it is- the moment you
walk into a post modern approach, you cannot keep a border line, you have to
break out of all kinds of boarder line but without avoiding the cultural icons,
visual symbols or psychological symbols,
What makes the whole
exercise interesting is when the symbols are used do deliver a different
meaning which may or may not work depending on the circumstances.
Dilip Tamuly
I have a serious problem with the ongoing performance
practices, it is not just my problem but a problem faced by all because we are
trying to identify the grammar and understand what can be a method for performance
art. This difficulty is reflected in the term itself whether to call it
performance art or performing art. Whether you agree or not it is already
there, one belongs to the visual art practice and the other belongs to the
larger cultural practice, so the perspective and the experiential detail is
entirely different. That is why I feel I am in an in- between space of a larger
public domain and a very personalized, artistic presentation.
Since I am still exploring the field I feel very confused, as
to whether I should call myself performance artist or address with some other
term.
The performative circumstance is already present in Assam,
people understand, see and visit theater so the culture is already there, but
there are other reasons too. Though things are happening, people are constantly
saying there is no working space in Assam for fine arts, and there is no
working environment for artistic practices. ……… So we have to check it out by
practice and by physical presence, because sitting in Delhi we can easily
comment but to go to the space and to observe it to experience it is a
completely different thing,
………………In two or three days you cannot understand the effect
of what is happening.
We have to understand how the space is giving shape to the
ideas. It is important to check the environment basically and to generate a proper
dialogue because there is a working environment but the dialogue is somehow
missing. Dialogue is in two terms- in theoretical terms a theoretical understanding
and a critical vision, which ‘as a fact’ is seriously missing. The second is a
dialogue between the working artists and the agencies and spaces, where there
is no co- ordination and even if the co –ordination is there it is not visible.
…………………So the exercise and the RAPE is not an effort towards
creating any brand.
In case of art the so called high art practices are governed
by the western model or the pan Indian model of gallery and connoisseurship etc
to an extent that there is no voluntary aspect to it. We see people changing
their visual language also because of the monitory conditions.
So it was important to go to the voluntary model, the kinds
that are happening in the theaters, to do art for own sake and pleasure first.
Then there might come out a genuine idiom, since performance is a very idiomatic
practice, thus to find out a particular language.
We never stand in front of an art work for more than five
minutes but performance has an appeal which makes people watch an art activity
for longer duration. This is an achievement, because it generates a mood and
the aspect of “seeing” which is important.
Samudra Kajal Saikia
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