In the recent day, violence and mayhem has become an intricate part of the lifestyle, to the denizen of the country. It feels like everyone is trapped in an endless cycle of bloodshed. Experiencing violence on daily basis embeds paranoia inside regular citizens. The creative minds, such as that of an artist is also affected by this havoc. The acceptance of violence is visible everywhere. A visual artist is not excluded from this milieu. Some artists, who are constantly living in and observing these situations have worked together to bring a live art exhibition.
Curating based group art exhibition Celebrated Violence! is curated by Wakilur Rahman and Kehkasha Sabah. The contemporary exhibition is going on at the Dhaka Art Centre and will end on February 14.
A total of eleven artists, Shisir Bhattachajee, Nisar Hossain, Mustafa Zaman, Abdul Halim Chanchal, Farzana Ahmed Urmi, Javed Jalil, Jihan Karim, Moon Rahman, Ripon Saha and Sharad Das participated in the two parted exhibition which combines a wide-range of artists, from art teacher to art enthusiastic housewives. In the second part of the exhibition, a series of vibrant artworks by Anisuzzaman Sohel was displayed under the title Neural Correlets at the Dhaka Art Summit.
At the opening, an interactive art event by Nisar Hossain featured a demonstration of barbecue fiesta of a human body and then the barbecued body piece was served to the spectators. The event shows that the horror of terrorism and violence is becoming normal to people as they are exposed to these heinous and terrifying incidents on a regular basis.
Eminent artist and art faculty Shisir Bhattachajee participated in the exhibition with his sole artwork titled Daag Tamasha. The acrylic painting on canvas is mostly done with the inspiration from the stream of life. Art faculty Nisar Hossain’s series of artworks titled A Diary from Hell is combined with interactive sound installations. Mustafa Zaman, editor of the art magazine Depart participated in the section titled Art Sentenced. The exhibition features photo installation with text, object and depicts a human’s life as a sentence – cleverly framed as a delectable product in a market environment.
Abdul Halim Chanchal’s series of artworks titled CMG Inhaler Campaign is inspired by Ahmed Sofa’s poem Seal Macher Kachlot. The bold artworks portrayed intrinsic meaning of the poem with irony.
Waqilur Rahman, curator of the exhibition said: “The curating based art exhibition is not a common event here. The project is not formulated by pre-planned assignments to the artists, rather we, the curators collect artworks from the artists matching the theme.’’
While Kekasha Sabah, another curator of the project verifies the intention behind selecting Dhaka Art Center as the venue as it attracts various types of audience. All the participating artists will be present at the exhibition venue on February 13 for a tete-a-tete with the spectators, to make the exhibition vibrant.
