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CAST OF CHARACTERS: My dada (paternal grandfather) My dadi (paternal grandmother) My nana (maternal grandfather) His younger brother A bookshop owner in Assam A bookshop owner in Ferozepur I was at a wedding in February when I learned something new about my dada – that he was a voracious reader, and a lover of arts and culture. I never got to meet him, so I was moved by this tidbit. What could I have learned from him? What could we have exchanged ideas about? Thus far I'd known of him as a dental surgeon, albeit one who had made a multi-generational family tree. This was a whole new world opening up.  As I stuffed my face with food, I also learned that my dadi , whom I've also never met, was a reader too, and encouraged this habit in her children. She took them out to watch a play every month. She insisted that they read or borrow at least one book in Hindi when they visited the Dilli Public Library opposite the old Delhi railway station. No wonder, then, that my dad and his s...

CAST OF CHARACTERS: Wild mushrooms My mother My nani (maternal grandmother) My nani's mother (my great-grandmother) My father My bua (father's sister) My dadi (paternal grandmother) My brother Me Did you inherit any weird tastes from your family? One of the oddest things "passed down" to me is an unhealthy suspicion of mushrooms. I didn't eat them growing up, and until recently, I thought my mother hadn't either. We asked my nani once if she liked mushrooms, and she said that she never knew what they were when she was younger (and no).  When my grandparents decided to build a house in the Himalayas in the late 1960s, there were wild mushrooms to contend with. These could be poisonous and risky, so my great-grandmother was naturally stressed about this particular dietary adventure that I presume was communicated to her.  In this letter from 1970, my great-grandmother writes, "I always feel nervous about you'll eating mushrooms anyway & more so now...

It is always a bit disconcerting to be woken up in the middle of the night because there's a gigantic fire right opposite your house. My nose was already clogged up thanks to the season of spring, living in Delhi, and the smoke I had been inhaling in my room for hours previously. This was probably quite possibly unrelated to said fire; I had chalked it down to the routine burning of leaves or some other mysterious paraphernalia that happens quite frequently in my neck of the woods (yes, you read that correctly. In the most polluted city in the world , the burning of stuff in the open causing more pollution is a routine occurrence and no one seems to have succeeded in stopping it). Just before going to bed, I also heard a loud blast in the BSES power plant opposite, but as this isn't all that unusual either, I dismissed it. So there I was, being shaken awake by my mother, who was telling me in a sombre whisper to move to the next room because the power had been out for a wh...

The Indian photographer collaborates with papier-mâché artists from a small village in Maharashtra in her most recent series. This article was originally published on Art Radar on 20 February 2018. Image: Gauri Gill, Untitled, from "Acts of Appearance," 2015-ongoing. Courtesy the artist. In “Acts of Appearance”, the faces of people are concealed by quirky masks of their own making. Gauri Gill (b. 1970, Chandigarh) often documents and collaborates with minority communities, as well as local artists, in her work. For “ Acts of Appearance ” (2015-ongoing), she involved a traditional Adivasi artist community belonging to the Konkana tribe in Maharashtra’s Jawhar district. A part of this series premiered at Documenta 14 in Kassel in 2017.  A community of artists  The idea for the series arose when Gill first heard about the papier-mâché artists of Maharashtra, who also wear sacred masks during festivals and rituals. She then commissioned the artist brothers Subhas and Bhagvan...

I've been looking for motivation and new ways of seeing (and of making images), so in December 2017, I set myself a challenge: to take one, and only one, photograph every day. This sounds fairly easy, so I upped the difficulty level by digging out our old film camera, which hasn't been used in at least a decade. I had forgotten the finer points of best practice, and because I couldn't see how the pictures were turning out, I was basically shooting in the dark (literally, as it turns out, now that the photos are finally printed and about half didn't materialise at all). This project certainly pushed me to be more disciplined, and to get to know my neighbourhood a lot better. It was harder than I thought. It meant I got only one decision, only one chance every day. It also meant that I was constantly worried about finding something worthy of a decent photo. And then there was the search for a studio to develop the photos, which it turns out is now rather rare and expen...

4 June 2015  A slightly cooler Thursday found your newly instated friendly Frangipani* reporter braving the autos of Delhi rather more enthusiastically, eager to dance. Running into the Bridge Room  –  the new line dance HQ  –  she found all of 3 Frangipanis diligently practising the Caballero with their always lively teacher. The intimate group has grown smaller and quieter this summer as many of their number are globetrotting, from London to Argentina, but this makes little difference on the dance floor with lively music pulsing through the room.  Having heard rather a lot about the Lilies*, who practise for an hour after class and hang out at Ethiopian coffee houses  –  and even have their own representative columnist, your reporter decided to stay back and dance with (read: spy on) them. Two months’ worth of progress at being taken seriously was ruined as I became the “new kid” again. After being told that I must never replace the guru, and th...

__ Delhi October 2014 Canon EOS 500D | EF50mm f/1.8

I spoke to Jayasri Burman at her studio in Delhi, discussing her artistic process and inspiration, the playful nature of her paintings and how she chooses which stories to tell. This article was originally published on Art Radar (14 March 2014). Image: Jayasri Burman. Image courtesy Gallery Sumukha. Jayasri Burman, exhibiting her first solo show in Hong Kong at the Hong Kong Visual Art Centre in March 2014, creates art that merges the traditional with the contemporary. Combining graphics and bright colours, Burman places her characters in mythological settings and stylised surroundings, creating a discrete tension between old and new, real and unreal.  Born in 1960 in Kolkata, India, Jayasri Burman creates paintings and graphics that have been exhibited across the world. Her work has been part of several important exhibitions such the International Triennale, Germany (1987), “A Tribute to Vincent Van Gogh” at Vadehra Art Gallery, New Delhi (1991), and “Indian Cont...

February was eventful. Lots of art - and some good food. Following our exploration of what St.Art Delhi has done to Shahpur Jat (see previous post), here's more. At the India Art Fair Basel Abbas and Ruanne Abou-Rahme at INSERT2014, Mati Ghar, IGNCA INSERT2014 Crafts Museum Cafe Lota Subodh Gupta at the NGMA Lodi Gardens __ Delhi February 2014

Shahpur Jat is getting a makeover thanks to the urban art festival St. Art Delhi . Check it out! Sujata painting the outside of the Delhi State Fruit & Vegetable Consumers Co-operative Federation (!) Cat mural by Anpu Varkey, and lower mural by the UFO team Nadira by Ranjit Dahiya (Bollywood Art Project)   Collab by Tofu and Anpu   Stencil by Foa Stencil by Tona   __ Shahpur Jat, New Delhi February 2014