Re-trace

Suresh Kumar Singha

The idea of a lived space is heavily dependent upon our approach as to how we see it, how we act in it and interpret it. All living and inanimate beings including human activity, land, objects, and natural phenomenon contribute to the transformation of space. I realized that these spaces where I spend time on a regular basis, carry history in the form of material and non-material aspects and from these observations emerge the motifs and details of stories. Through my constant visits to different sites, I have built a close relationship with them by engaging with their physical and psychological aspects. These lines and forms are traces of my visual imagination and memory as well as my encounter with the environment. This series is a personal narrative of space – a visual diary – capturing my everyday moments and encounters with my surroundings. I use natural pigments, soil and tea wash, to create my drawings. Sometimes, I directly draw at the site and at times, I collect photographs of a site to be able to work on the drawings at a later point. I lay emphasis on the role of materiality to portray not only how we abstractly relate to space but also to understand the ways in which a space carries its living and non-living components – carries within itself aspects of travel, time, stages and transformation.