Bikalpa Art Center would like to invite you to view the final outcome of the residency program happening for last 6 weeks. Monday, 30th September 2019, from 5:30 pm to late the Bikalpa Art Center (BAC) will celebrate the final exhibition of AIR participating artists; Wesley John (NEW ZEALAND), Mahima Singh (NEPAL), Oliver Aoun (LEBANON) and Durga Sunuwar (NEPAL)
Artists in Residency Program detail
Residency (15th August – 29th September 2019)
Open Studio Final Exhibition (30th September – 4th October 2019)
Exhibition opening reception: 6:00pm onwards
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Participating artists
Wesley John: NEW ZEALAND
Wesley John Fourie is an artist based between the Milford Track in UNESCO World Heritage Site Fiordland National Park in New Zealand, and Haridwar in the state of Uttarakhand, India. Their work is the amalgamation of an interest in the role of queer identity, spirituality, and the relationship between nature and the divine. Between the two countries they create multimedia art that manifests in large scale knitted objects, large scale paintings, and smaller, highly detailed drawings. Their work has also been installative, ephemeral, written, and performative, with a focus on textiles and treating nature as art.
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Mountain & Flowers for an unforgotten lover Wesley John Fourie Mountain: The pieces in the installation “Mountain” pay homage to Sagarmatha, the tallest point on earth. Using soil, knitted textile, a fan, and prayer flags, the artist guides the viewer into an immersive imagined landscape at the foot of Everest. This piece continues an ongoing dialogue the artist hopes to communicate with their audience, that nature is sacred. Flowers for an unforgotten lover: In this work, using soil, plants, and seeds, the artist invites the audience to collaborate in the construction of the work by following a simple set of instructions. 1. Remember a loved one who has left your life, this could be someone who has died, a relationship that has ended, a friendship that was lost, etc. 2. Plant a seed in memory of this person. 3. Light an incense stick, and offer gratitude for loved ones in your life. The intention of this work is to draw reverence to the greatest gift we have all collectively been given, life. By asking the audience to consider a relationship that has ended, we are immediately afterwards forced to examine our relationships with those still in our lives, and what each of those relationships represent to us. By planting the seed, we mimic the cycle of life and death, one thing impacts another, and we can reflect on the impermanent nature of life.
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Mahima Singh NEPAL
Mahima Singh is a visual artist, who is currently working in the mediums of performance, portraiture, and installation art. She is inspired by the uncertainty and violent she sees in the world, her work is particularly influenced by natural disasters, disease, violence, and terrorism. We see these acts of horrific violence on the news and in real-life every day; Mahima’s work reflects on the toll this has on the fragility of human life. Her latest project (2017 to present) is a series of postmortem portraits of those who passed away in the April 2015 earthquake. These mixed-medium portraits question our materialistic world and showcase the impermanence of life.
Mahima holds Masters of Fine Arts from the Korea National University of Art, South Korea. Her work has been shown in two solo exhibitions, Spontaneity and Control in DM gallery and The Rain in Godo gallery, both in Seoul, South Korea in 2012.
Mahima is excited to be a part of Trans Art Studio project 3.0, as it will afford her the opportunity to collaborate and discuss her ideas with people working in different disciplines. She hopes to learn from all the workshops, interactions and presentations from the professionals of different background to enhance her work and to grow as an artist.
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Oliver Aoun LEBANON
Oliver Aoun (born in 1988, Beirut), graduate of the Paris VIII University in contemporary Arts, and the ESRA Film School (Paris) in Documentary and Film, is based between Beirut and Paris.
Oliver’s work revolves around an exploration of the status of the document-image, and the writing of a personal poetics of loss. In an anamnestic approach, Oliver Aoun therefore undertakes a work of collective and individual mourning, and for that playing with the flaws and the numerical and mechanical limits, as well as the specificities of the cameras with which he works: Over-saturations, mechanical fillings, slowdowns, diurnal overexposures, digital zoom over-voltages, series of optical post-war world, sensors having difficulties to de-code infrared rays, these technical limits help to establish a singular poetic of loss.
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Durga Sunuwar NEPAL
Durga Sunuwar (Sara Tunich Koinch) is an art learner, art lover, and a freelance artist. She was born in Sindhuli, Nepal. She moved from Sindhuli to Kathmandu pursue her artistic career. She has always been inspired from her childhood by her parent who are local artisans and shopkeepers. market shop-keeper and a carpenter.
She has participated in several national art exhibitions like Alfresco Art exhibition 2017/18 by Alfresco Magazine; National Aart 2017-18-19; Season, women group exhibition 2019 and Commerative painting workshop.
