A Photogenetic Line : CPB 2019
Feb. 22, 2019 - March 24, 2019
New work at the Chennai Photo Bienniale, drawing from the photo archives of The Hindu, a 140-year old newspaper based out of Chennai.
A 100-foot long branching sequence of cutouts. Cutouts are here a way of reframing and rebirthing existing photographs as new organisms. Not to remove their background environments, nor to frame heroic figures, but to create a new boundary or border for the image. A border, interior or exterior, that leads us to the next image.
The sequence evolves by following one or more of these basic rules:
a. People in the images grow older, or younger. b. Things in the background come into the foreground, or vice versa. c. Two photo captions refer to each other.
We traverse a series of perceptual (shape), historical (time) and geographic (political) boundaries. Here, like in cinema, the cut is not a brick wall but an invitation: for increased traffic at any border.
Photo: Sunlight falls on part of the installation at the Senate House, a prominent Indo-Saracenic building at the University of Madras.
