A PASSAGE THROUGH PASSAGES: On Roads in South Asia
Jan. 16, 2020 - July 10, 2020
SOAS Gallery, London
This exhibition takes us on new and recently rebuilt roads across regions of Pakistan, Sri Lanka, the Maldives, and India. We travel through the early twentieth century to the central-Indian "Nagpur Road Plan" of 1943 before heading to the hope, promise, acceleration, and hubris of later decades. It takes now-impossible journeys across nation-states, on roads after and before conflicts, and onto coralline oceanic edges.
Endoscopic views from the interior of the road system, and forays across the porous membranes through which pride, money, data, climate, and vulnerability are connected to it, heighten our sense of developmental possibility, failure, and the deep ambiguity of road achievements. ‘A Passage Through Passages’ is inspired by ethnographic and archival work in five field sites.
A multi-screen film work by CAMP is the central feature of the exhibition.
