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17/2/2012

Shilpa Gupta

Arnhem Museum of Modern Art MMKA, Arnhem

"Fear has to give way to dialogue- this leads to the altering of structures, perceptions , hierarchies", the Indian artist Shilpa Gupta (1976, Mumbai) observed in 2008. This statement not only expresses Gupta’s attitude, but it also forms a significant foundation for the work which has brought her international recognition since 1997. In her sculptures, photos, multimedia installations, digital projects, and projects in public spaces she challenges the viewer to react in the hopes that she can subvert his or her perceptions of reality.

The Museum voor Moderne Kunst Arnhem will present Shilpa Gupta’s first solo exhibition in the Netherlands, starting Saturday 18 February, 2012. Eight installations will be on view, including her most recent, There is No Explosive in This (2011). In this installation, Gupta uses a large number of items, such as water bottles, corkscrews, and nail clippers, that travellers are required to hand over when passing through the security checkpoint at the airport. Crossing borders, both literally and figuratively, is a recurring theme in Shilpa Gupta’s work. She constantly points to the ways in which our daily lives are intertwined with, and significantly influenced by, history, religion, local traditions, the media, and international developments. After the religiously-motivated violence in the state of Gujarat in 2002, in which a train went up in flames and hundreds of commuters died, Gupta sold bottles of fake blood on trains and in stations. The label ‘Blame’ and text ‘I blame you for what you cannot control – your religion, your nationality’ evoked heated responses. During her participation in the Dutch commemoration of the 400-year history of the Dutch East India Company in 2002, Gupta’s interactive Your Kidney Supermarket examined the overwhelming free market economy in which even human organs are treated in economic terms. Gupta used her stipend for participating in this event to buy 45 three-wheeler vehicles for disabled people in Mumbai, contributing to another form of ‘borderless’ mobility.

Gupta’s solo exhibition at the MMKA features eight recent installations. Threat consists of a stack of hundreds of skin-coloured soaps. The word ‘threat’ is stamped into each piece of soap, as if the threat of terror is something you cannot wash away. In her video installation Half Widows (2009), the artist focuses on the despair felt by roughly 1,500 women whose husbands, sent as soldiers to the contested Kashmir valley, have since disappeared. Cage features three cages nested in one another, creating a claustrophobic effect; once trapped in the inner-most cage, it seems as if there is no way out. In a completely different manner, Gupta suggests a wilful obstruction in the installation (title) in which seven doors are connected so that no one door leads to an entrance.

The exhibition ‘Shilpa Gupta’ was put together by the Canadian curator Renee Baert, in cooperation with the Fonderie Darling in Montreal, and will travel to the Cultuurcentrum Bruges after Arnhem. A publication will accompany the exhibition.

Image: Shilpa Gupta, (title), 2011.

Arnhem Museum of Modern Art MMKA
Utrechtseweg 87 - Arnhem
Hours: Tuesday – Sunday and holidays 11 a.m. – 5 p.m.
Admission: 9 euro, concession: 5 euro

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