“Once a certain idea of landscape, a myth, a vision, establishes itself in an actual place, it has a peculiar way of muddling categories, of making metaphors more real than their referents; of becoming in fact, part of the scenery.”
Simon Schama

Three years ago I embarked on a project that looked at unravelling the hidden world of amateur astronomers in Delhi. Beginning as a form of collective investigation with ‘astro-nomads’ or amateur astronomers in Delhi, stories, conversations and histories came together as a chronicle of this almost obsessive group of people whose lives are transformed by the night sky. As an amateur astronomer and an artist myself, this was also an exercise in self reflexivity. Where did I position myself within the material, or perhaps where did astronomy position itself within my practice? As part of the research I travelled across the country chasing comets and stars with other amateur astronomers, each trip focused on a stellar event or site.

Deep Time is part of this ongoing project that looks to map common points between astronomy and art practice, through the lens of metaphor. These works  are explorations of strange terrains where myth and fiction blur the boundaries of what may be perceived as real or imagined.

When trying to imagine the unimaginable we are forced to fall back on the powers of projection; of an imagination which recycles past impressions and memories, projecting them onto the strange/ unfamiliar to render it conceivable. Yet, one way of gaining new perspectives on a situation is to juxtapose it with something completely unrelated, thereby making the familiar…. strange.
Deep Time offers metaphoric and geographic propositions towards this morphing relationship between the real and the imagined, projected memories and unimagined presents and futures… Maps that chart the unobservable through a metaphoric plotting of the observed.

“The deep-time sciences (astronomy, geology) demand a double feat of imagination on the part of their practitioners: to compass the gargantuan time scales in which life evolves or stars form; and to project their own discipline far enough back into the past and forward into the future so that the patterns that emerge only after eons can be recorded and detected. They are the guardians of the far past in the service of the far future.”
Lorraine Daston

Part of this research was undertaken under the Sarai Associate Fellowship of the ‘City as Studio’ initiative at CSDS, Delhi between February – November 2010. It was further developed during a residency at the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science in Berlin between March – June 2012.

deep time projects

MONOGRAPHED GEOGRAPHIES | mixed media on archival pigment prints | 2013

READING INTO THE STARS | audio vignette | 2013

SURVEYOR| drawing on archival pigment prints | 2013

SHADOW WALKERS | audio vignette | 2010

SURFACE TRACKING | drawings | 2013

PARTS UNKNOWN | seven channel video installation | 2012

PARTS UNKNOWN | wall drawing | 2012

Photographs taken of the dome of the planetarium in Patna, India while waiting for a total solar eclipse.

Surface Tracking is the first in a series of drawing and print works that examine the landscapes where encounters between astronomers and the stars take place.

The 12 hand drawn maps are aerial views of one of the most important observatories in India, the Giant Meterwave Radio Telescope Array (GMRT) just outside the city of Pune. Of the thirty dishes,  fourteen are located more or less randomly in a compact central array in a region of about 1 sq km. The remaining sixteen dishes are spread out along the 3 arms of an approximately `Y’-shaped configuration over a much larger region.  Used by astronomers across the world, research at the facility includes determination of the epoch of galaxy formation in the universe, Pulsar research and the observation of different astronomical objects such as galaxies, supernovae, the sun and solar winds.

The telescope becomes an instrument of both fiction and fact, gazing up and out, transforming our imagination of remote objects as physical places in the imagination.  The watcher becomes the watched. The observer is now the observed.

Monographed Geographies are a series of three hybrid print and drawing works that will examine different frames set in astronomical observatories in India. The images are set in the high latitude desert of ladakh at an altitude of 14,500 feet, home to the Indian Astronomical Observatory (IAO) at Hanle, one of the world’s highest sites for optical, infrared and gamma-ray telescopes. The latter collect gamma rays, one of the most enigmatic and energetic forms of light in the universe, created by celestial events such as supernova explosions, the creation of black holes and the decay of radioactive material in space. Hanle exists today as a site of pilgrimage for astronomers across India, amateurs and professionals alike, drawn as much by the spectacular skies as by the stark landscape.

MONOGRAPHED GEOGRAPHIES I – VALLEY| Colour pencil on archival pigment print |124 x 31 inches | 2013

MONOGRAPHED GEOGRAPHIES II – MOUNTAIN| Colour pencil on archival pigment print |124 x 29 inches | 2013

MONOGRAPHED GEOGRAPHIES III – DESERT| Colour pencil on archival pigment print |124 x 31 inches | 2013

With special thanks to the Indian Astronomical Observatory (IAO), run by the Indian Institute of Astrophysics, Bangalore.

The night sky is ambiguous. It represents a blank canvas and surface on which individual desires, thoughts and feelings can be mapped and projected. Celestial phenomena such as stars, planets, and nebulae are imbued with special meaning or affection, becoming an intimate part of the individuals who gaze up at them.

Both cosmology and fiction share a quest for pattern and meaning. In both cases we could also say that it is the viewer/reader who as an active agent imparts existence to the work and completes its meaning through interpretation.

The piece is divided into three sections, Reading into the Stars which explores the deep psychological attachment between the astronomer and the night sky. The Social Imaginary which questions the idea of the astronomer as a solitary figure and finally The Strange which explores the poignancy and strangeness of some of these histories.

Satellite images of a radio telescope array in Ladakh and their surrounding landscape, captured with the aid of the open source software NASA WorldWind, overlaid with drawing transform these spaces into strangely mythic terrains. The telescope becomes an instrument of both fiction and fact, gazing up and out, transforming our imagination of remote objects as physical places in the imagination. The watcher becomes the watched. The observer is now the observed.

Mimic | photo etch and soft ground etching on somerset paper | 37 inches x 10.5 inches | edition of 5 | 2014

Mirror| photo etch and soft ground etching on somerset paper | 37 inches x 10.5 inches | edition of 5 | 2014

“the infinite universe is above all a universe of new modes of comportment and deportment. The imagination becomes an organ of quite unprecedented positivity, when, in the open horizon of the not-impossible, the unexpected has become precisely what can be expected at all times.”

Blumenberg, Hans. Paradigms for a Metaphorology. Translated by Robert Ian Savage. Cornell University Press, 2010.

Parts Unknown – image credit Ryan Waggoner, courtesy Spencer Museum of Art 2016

P a r t s   U n k n o w n, Installation view at Project 88 | seven channel video with sound | wall drawing | 2013

Two years ago, I began a project that looked at unravelling the hidden world of amateur astronomers in Delhi. Beginning  as a form of collective investigation with ‘astro-nomads’ or amateur astronomers in Delhi,  stories, conversations and histories… came together in a slowly building chronicle of the almost obsessive group of people whose lives have been transformed by the night sky. Who were these individuals who watched the stars and invested their resources in the activity? Why did they continue to chase eclipses and other celestial phenomena across the country and sometimes the world? What drew them to the night sky? What did they see when they gazed at it night after night?  What were the landscapes where such encounters took place?  As an amateur astronomer and an artist, the project was also an exercise in self reflexivity.  Where did I position myself within the project, or perhaps where did astronomy position itself within my practice?  Beginning in July 2009 through to August 2010, I traveled back and forth across the country with amateur astronomers as part of the process, each trip focused on a stellar event or site.
Parts Unknown is part of an ongoing project that looks to map common points between astronomy and art practice, through the lens of metaphor.

When trying to imagine the unimaginable we are forced to rely on the powers of projection, the imagination which recycles past impressions and memories, projecting them onto the strange to render them conceivable. Yet one way of gaining new perspectives on a situation is to juxtapose it with something completely unrelated, thereby making the familiar…. strange.

Set in the high latitude desert of ladakh at an altitude of 14,500 feet, the Indian Astronomical Observatory (IAO) at Hanle, is one of the world’s highest sites for optical, infrared and gamma-ray telescopes. The latter collect gamma rays, one of the most enigmatic and energetic forms of light in the universe, created by celestial events such as supernova explosions, the creation of black holes and the decay of radioactive material in space. Hanle exists today as a site of pilgrimage for astronomers across India, amateurs and professionals alike, drawn as much by the spectacular skies as by the stark landscape.

Parts Unknown, a suite of seven videos is a window to a strangely mythic landscape, populated by instruments of both fiction and fact, gazing up and out, transforming our imagination of remote objects as physical places in the imagination.  From machines they are transformed into a species of ‘chimera’. They are one thing, standing in for something else, pushing the limits of the known and the imagined. Plotted  against the quadrant of space home to the Pleiades open star cluster the piece offers us seven perspectives of new terrains and fictions, created through the layering of video with drawings and satellite images of the Earth. An alternative hybridized world, once familiar and now strange.

So slow as to seem still, the frames remain static with just the sunlight moving across the landscape, the clouds moving across the mountains, or the rain drops falling on the screen. Each frame implicates Man. But whether of man’s deeds long past or present is unclear.

They take on a mythic, fictional character. We are not quite sure who has placed these cameras here, the small format and the proximity required from the viewer to see the detail lends a quality of footage captured by a planetary rover, the space exploration vehicle designed to move across the surface of a planet or other astronomical body.

Parts Unknown video files

With special thanks to the Indian Astronomical Observatory (IAO), run by the Indian Institute of Astrophysics, Bangalore.

A walk down memory lane by devoted umbraphiles, those who are addicted to walking in the shadow of the moon… Seven voices, ranging in tone, depth, age, experience and perspective, talking about the single most transforming celestial event, a total solar eclipse. The vignette is played on MP3 players arranged in any open space under the sky. Mats provide a surface for people to lie under the sky / stars and listen to the piece. There is an intimacy to the experience. As few as one, as many as 50 people lying down together gazing up at the sky, mimicking the act of amateur astronomers world over, and like them linked by common experience, in this case of the audio files, of the experience of this ‘collective rest or sleep’.

SHADOW WALKERS | audio vignette | duration 16 mins |10 mats |10 Mp3 players | installation at SARAI, Centre for Developing Societies, New Delhi, August 2010

SHADOW WALKERS | audio vignette | duration 16 mins |14 mats |14 Mp3 players | installation at KHOJLIVE12, Blue Frog, New Delhi, January  2012