Structural Spaces, 2010
Structural Space
These works are about my experience of space.
The space of new places, of daily travel, of walking, of movements and of recent activities.
Space is place. It is surroundings. It is also the space inside my body, where I feel my cells moving in irregular circles. These movements define my structural forms.
My experience of space is like walking on a bridge. I am afraid of walking on bridges because the iron rods, sometimes wooden, create an illusion—I see the moving water in the holes between rather than the solid frames which hold me. I see these negative and positive structures through my emotions. These aspects of an experience create the visual forms in my work.
In my art, I focus on the structural forms rather than the story of my experience. In Kathak dance, the floor and walls demarcate the outside, the physical boundary of the dancer. The inner part is formed by the dancer’s body, inside of which the solid mass can turn to water. Around the body’s centre, filled with fluidity, the dancer creates a circle which is unique and perfect—not a mathematically correct circle, but perfection, created through balance. It is these experiences that have allowed me to create new structures.
In my recent work, I have used space created from construction sites. My fascination is with the iron rod frames which form the main structure of the buildings. In the Kathmandu Valley, the urban sprawl has gradually covered and consumed the greenery and organic lines of nature. Although this feels like an attack against the nature we have known and trusted, the manmade constructs remain within the laws and rules of nature. Time and growth lay woven into the structure. As one rod crosses another, they are locked into place and become the base for the next weave. In this form, the past remains visible and exists even as the present moves into the future. The interlacing layers enclose, divide and redefine the space, creating a contradiction between the solid iron rods and the boundless air between. Contradictions like these embody my life.
The form of my work comes from such personal experiences. These experiences are created by the space of time and my movements within the space of time.
These works are about my experience of space.
The space of new places, of daily travel, of walking, of movements and of recent activities.
Space is place. It is surroundings. It is also the space inside my body, where I feel my cells moving in irregular circles. These movements define my structural forms.
My experience of space is like walking on a bridge. I am afraid of walking on bridges because the iron rods, sometimes wooden, create an illusion—I see the moving water in the holes between rather than the solid frames which hold me. I see these negative and positive structures through my emotions. These aspects of an experience create the visual forms in my work.
In my art, I focus on the structural forms rather than the story of my experience. In Kathak dance, the floor and walls demarcate the outside, the physical boundary of the dancer. The inner part is formed by the dancer’s body, inside of which the solid mass can turn to water. Around the body’s centre, filled with fluidity, the dancer creates a circle which is unique and perfect—not a mathematically correct circle, but perfection, created through balance. It is these experiences that have allowed me to create new structures.
In my recent work, I have used space created from construction sites. My fascination is with the iron rod frames which form the main structure of the buildings. In the Kathmandu Valley, the urban sprawl has gradually covered and consumed the greenery and organic lines of nature. Although this feels like an attack against the nature we have known and trusted, the manmade constructs remain within the laws and rules of nature. Time and growth lay woven into the structure. As one rod crosses another, they are locked into place and become the base for the next weave. In this form, the past remains visible and exists even as the present moves into the future. The interlacing layers enclose, divide and redefine the space, creating a contradiction between the solid iron rods and the boundless air between. Contradictions like these embody my life.
The form of my work comes from such personal experiences. These experiences are created by the space of time and my movements within the space of time.