During the previous years of my academic journey, I have managed to work on socially relevant issues and gain a high level of personal satisfaction. Following my five-year plan, I travelled out of my comfort zones in summer 2019 to explore and experience the stories that are hidden within the Indian society. As an artist with Indian roots, I believe I must soar awareness about issues that never get discussed under the limelight.
Casteism is a heavily rooted problem in Indian society. Although caste-based discrimination is illegal in India, the stigmatisation and violence against the marginalised remain pervasive both in the subcontinent and Indian diaspora. Having had conversations with people who are still affected by this inhuman, unequal system, I was continually searching for answers for questions that haunted me. It was challenging to accept the fact that I was part of this system unknowingly living in denial by looking off from this injustice. Discovering the concept of 'Muthappan and Parassinikadavu Temple' came as a great Redemption. Thus this project is titled 'Redemption' as the shrine itself stands as a depiction of secular harmony.
As it is crucial to have a great understanding of history and theories of this subject area, I chose to link my contextual study to this practice module. Even though this was a time consuming and slow process, I managed to maintain a steady workflow by working on both the contextual and practise module at the same time. My research sources were extensive as it ranged from movies to archives. I consider the 2018 Tamil movie named 'Pariyerum Perumal' as my primary research material. It is a kind of film, that open ups discussions about caste, oppression, equality and education. This movie helped me to ponder more about this topic, which I never considered before or in other words, my thoughts were suppressed by caste and its boundaries.
Two main theories that encouraged me to reflect broadly on this topic was Christopher Pinney's 'Camera Indica', and Gayatri Spivak's 'Can the subaltern speak?'. Pinney and Spivak in their theories, discuss the colonial impact on the caste structure, which spurred me to combine an element that represents the colonial presence. Working with coffee stain technique for the photo journal linked to the trade history during the colonial rule in India.
To communicate the process wholly to the viewer, I created a video that visualises the journey from Plymouth to the Parassinikadavu Temple. This process helped to learn video compositing and colour grading software such as Adobe After Effects and Davinci Resolve. I am pleased with the progress of my technical learning flow, as I consider knowledge in technical aspects as my weakness.
Collecting case studies from Kerala about Muthappan and the temple helped to accelerate my knowledge about a tradition which was alien for me. From studying archival research materials, I moved to surreal digital works of Jishnu Krishnan and Elzo Durt, to highlight the elements that make the concept of Muthappan stand out in a society constrained with social barriers created by caste and religion. I believe surreal art depicts everything in its purest form and helps to express emotions and thoughts coherently. Using a Wacom for this process was very challenging; however, Wacom provided better control over the tools on Photoshop.
Attending crits sessions and tutorials provided a very structural feedback to improve the creative process. This project helped me to critically analyse works of artists from various genre of photography as well as art in general. I learned bookbinding techniques and various designing aspects by creating a handmade journal and producing multiple prototypes of the books allowed erasing out the mistakes and experiment throughout the process.
Having a considerate amount of following on Social media has helped to keep my works always on momentum. I have also entered several competitions and started developing proposals to apply for grants to help me with upcoming projects. I also got the opportunity to present my first solo exhibition at project space one, which is scheduled on the 10th of February 2020. This helped to research on curatorial designs to develop a unique curator style. Overall, this module accelerated my growth creatively and professionally as an emerging artist. There was group crits end of every week, which had doubtlessly helped my communication skills and to exchange ideas with my peers and tutors effectively. My workflow stayed consistent, and I managed to achieve the level of great satisfaction with the results.