What A Body Remembers
Solo Show by Seema Kohli
Tao Art Gallery
4th April 2018
One of the primary concerns in my artistic efforts has been the idea of a feminine energy, which in our traditions finds a representation in terms of a spiritual power: as Devi or Shakti or as Yogini or Matrika. My artistic works have tried to address this challenge of representing the chaotic dance of feminine energies but then seek to convey within that an emergent tranquility.
For me, the connection with Shakti is neither imposed by religious custom nor is it a purely, external source of artistic inspiration devoid of a spiritual content: instead, it inhabits the entire spectrum so that from different perspectival positions it may appear as belief, knowledge or inner conviction. When I work with representing the feminine energy on a canvas, in a sculptural installation or embodied in a performance, it is with the full realization that my work may be located in one or other of these slots depending on the perspective the viewer adopts to receive my work. My own effort has been to seek to convey my inner world through these artistic representations and go beyond stereotypical receptions of the work.
In the new body of works, I remain committed to the idea of feminine energies but have a self-reflexive turn and ask what relationship do I establish with these works. While I have so far articulated how feminine energies have completely absorbed me, what I would seek now is to go beyond this articulation and ask the ‘why’ question: Why is it important for me to represent these? When I ask this question, I realize that this cosmos of the feminine I try to recreate through my art is a door on a threshold. So far, like in a surreal dream, this door has existed in the middle of a barren, sandy desert. Now I attempt to look on both sides of the door and find one direction taking me into my home and the other out into the world.
In this new turn, I am attempting to uncover my singular engagement with what I have called ‘feminine’. I am very clear that I want to not reduce this to any level of sloganeering but to actually ‘read’ my own work to see what kind of connections to contemporary reality emerge naturally and organically through the course of such a reading. The songs of the yoginis and matrikas are also joys, the paeans and the laments of the lives of women through the ages. My paintings are narratives of women at some level, their lives, their vulnerabilities but also, most significantly, their strength. When they populate my paintings, one can see the expression of the power of the feminine collective, of women coming together to overcome the evil that confronts them. In these stories, I also discern my own space as a woman in the larger world outside.
I present 35 zinc plate etchings on paper titled Memoirs. These are a collection of works done over a period of several years. My memories while growing up, the images, objects, environment and people which influenced me.
Memoirs
Have you ever felt
the wet breath of soft viridian leaves
in early morning hours
Have you ever rubbed your hands
on the coarse stretched stomachs
of the vagabond trees
wet with the unannounced showering clouds
dancing to the rhythm of lightning
in the patio of infinite blue
I reach the skies here on earth
soaking in the innumerable oceans and the sea’s
momentarily resting on my palms as rain
Jan 27 2018
My sculptural painting Kamadhenu in fiberglass set me thinking as I work on the concept of gender in the realm of pure consciousness. Is gender the outer garb or the packaging?
This work has been inspired by the Indian mythological form of Aradhnareshwar-Shiva and Shakti. It is representative of amalgamation of pure consciousness and energy. In my sculptural painting the hump is of the bull and the udders of a cow. Every being I feel is an amalgamation of both yin and yang, positive and negative, man and woman. Hence crossing all genders. There is no conflict of gender here, it crosses all barriers. I share with you a few lines of my poetry “In Silence the Secrets Speak”. It expresses my deepest thoughts in simplest words.
The Ardhanarishwar –
Positive and negative.
Man and woman. not some hybrid creature,
But, man and woman united as symbols that complete the circle and cycle of life.
Conditioned by roles, perhaps…
The woman, a creative goddess, the nurturer, queen of the world,
a symbol of all that is gentle and good.
The man, keeper of the skies, king of the universe, a symbol of strength.
Not one without the other.
A complete circle of harmony.
Aligned with nature.
Nature itself.
Nature. Nurturer.
I put the woman at the center of the universe.
I put the man at the center of the universe.
It was this ‘completion’ of the cosmos that fascinated me.
Why should one be without the other.
May2013
The canvases are based on the heightened state of life, which we are all aspiring for. The birds, angels, gandharvas or simply our breath that becomes air as soon it breaks away from the physical forms. My colors are reflective of the inner peace and joy, vibrating with the rhythm and joy of life.
“The current exhibition traverses some of the most significant cusps of Seema’s journey, of which Hiranyagarbha (The Golden Womb) set her off on a journey where she moved away from flawed, limiting labels of feminism (in its Western construct as being obstructionist) to declare the universe as female, the womb of all creation, the seed of birth, the dot into which everything converges. But even more than these contextual subtexts is Seema’s use of mediums that here includes her luminescent acrylics on canvas with gold leaf that leaves them glowing – a technique one associates with her. But here too the delightful twist, for the exhibition includes her drawings and works on paper, those building blocks of an artist’s work – (her secrets!) – that we are rarely shown, but which reveal not such drafting skills and the way the eye moves, the fingers capture, but also the heart and soul of a painter’s universe.”-Kishore Singh, author and art colomunist.
Seema Kohli
Feb 2018