Mayura Subhedar

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The Media city workshop dedicated to the exploration of narrative architecture and social interaction in public space was hosted by Netherlands Media Art Institute and Time Frame made possible by the Mondriaan Foundation.

We the 8 invited artist were given the opportunity to explore the possibilities of visual programming interfaces for urban facades and develop our own site-specific concepts.

 



Videowall - 12 meter panoramic multichannel video projection on the facade of the Stadsschouwburg Utrecht. This work was especially made for Stadsschouwburg Utrecht.


 


At residency in Crossfire base projects I saw the opportunity to start working on a long cherished plan of having conversations with women who having come to the Nederlands from different part of worlds, with different body and maternity care norms and have adopted the very Dutch 'bevalling'.Who have experienced their bodies in the most visceral ways? This resulted into 3 sound pieces: Loss, Trust, Body and a 2 channeled video installation.

I believe cultural norms are inscribed in our bodies - what the body reveals about the culture it inhabits - in this case what a birthing body reveals forms the leitmotiv of this project in progress. More information on this link

 


 
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Subhedar’s video acts, act as mnemonics for her life stories, real and imagined. Yet, like all mnemonics, the female images do not produce the same tales with every telling.

The title of the work 'And I have no sons to float in the space between' is the last line of the iconic poem "The Idea of Ancestry," by famous African American poet Etheridge Knight. The poem’s imagery and especially the awareness of the vastness of space "the violent space" is crucial to this video work. The central fact of the video work is enclosure, confinement.

 
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Playing Bored, Bored Playing. In this series I have devised series of rituals for & against boredom, which are presented as instruction videos. The instructions and the necessary objects to play these games are all attractively packaged and presented in various red velvet lined boxes, bags.

I want to bring these trivial games 'of time pass' to the arena of preciously guarded artifacts. The choice of red velvet lining is crucial - an literal and physically much valued setting - safe guarding the mundane, the boring, the everyday.

 

 

 
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The projections were created as a decor for the play 'Wilde wespen en verboden vruchten'. The content - the animations are based on the works of the renowned 17th century artist Maria Sybilla Merian.

The play was directed by Karen Eve Johnson. Produced by Bureau Barrel and Stichting Lantaarndragers. It premiered in Paramaribo, Suriname in 2008 and is scheduled to tour the Netherlands in the end of 2009.

 

This video installation was created in 2008/2009 for the show HOME curated by Anupa Mehta. It was installed at Travancore gallery with support of Shrine art gallery in Delhi.

Conceived as a 3 channel video installation it is projected through the grid like object shaped like a house. It is a operatic piece where the music, the shadows created by the projections through the grid like object play an important role.

In collaboration with Rende Luitjes.

 
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Boredom - is a practice in everyday life, it is tragic comic but it haunts and motivates - it is anything but boring!I find the everydayness of life compelling.

In this series of video works /performances I chose Ordinariness as my anthem. Site specific video installation /performance made during my residency at The Loft in Mumbai in 2009.

 
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Handcaress & variations 2 is a video work made in 2008. This work shows my fascination with change- the continuing change/decay of the subject that happens beyond us, yet within. Rituals mark these changes, the passage of time, personal rituals allow us alternate ways of being in an overtly regularised world. The inherent quality of any ritual- repeating moment, repeating action, repeating gesture - allow's me to create repeating moments in time that offer a view of timelessness.

In the collection of Belgian collector Guy Verstraete.

 

A short documentary on the young Turkish designer Filiz Akzcakal living and working in Amsterdam. Commissioned by Kunstenaars & Co
 

A sense of direction, a short film made in collaboration with Nandini Bedi for the 48 hrs film festival in Amsterdam.

Screened at Ketelhuis, Amsterdam & at the Short attack film festival in Berlin.

 


The short film 'Olga & Sergei' was made for the exhibition 'Van huis uit' curated by Michael McMillian in 2007 in Imagine IC.

The film is based on the Russian migrant family and the story their home-interior tells us about their new and old life.

 

The short film 'Her patch of sky' was made for CinemAsia film festival 2006. The scenario was selected from 60 submissions. The short film was co-produced by Binger Institute and CinemAsia Film Lab and was screened in various theaters in the Netherlands during the film festival.
 

Handcaress & variations 1 is one of my earliest single channel video work, shot in abstract simplicity.It embodies all my concerns of temporal, physical, spiritual, sexual and racial. Where the repetitive gestures, actions, the process draws one to cycle of love, loss, pain and play.

It started with the sentence in Alice in wonderland, where the Queen ask's the knaves to be beheaded - as they did not paint the roses, red.

In collection of Devi art foundation India.

 

CC The short experimental film 'Closed circuit' was made on invitation from Imagine IC, Amsterdam for their opening manifestation in 2002.

The film is constructed from found surveillance footage from the Amsterdam Zuidoost area and home videos made by people living in and around Amsterdam Zuidoost.

 

Series of site specific installations done in 1998/99 at farm outside Mumbai and in the staircase of my apartment block in Thane.