When 28-year-old Poonam Jain arrived in Dubai from Mumbai a month in the past, she imagined herself as one of the crucial hundreds of thousands of nameless migrant employees. Jain, an artist-in-residence at Art Dubai, set to work daily in a uniform, gathering and counting concrete blocks that she then wiped clean, numbered through weight, and offered as a coded puzzle.
“Many employees requested me, ‘kaunsa company se’ (which company do you work for)?” Jain says. “The code symbolises a employee’s songs. To know its meaning, you need to talk to them,” she says. Over the following few weeks, she distilled the reports of Indian labourers via evocative works similar to Labour Card, which accommodates two stacks of bureaucracy used to mark attendance and dealing hours.
Her display, Burden of Proof, is likely one of the highlights of the 12th edition of Art Dubai, which ran from March 21 to 24 and featured 105 galleries from 42 countries. Jain is likely one of the 11 world artists selected for Art Dubai’s new non-profit Residents’ Programme. In many works, she channelled the emphasis on counting and numbering, especially in prayers, as a metaphor for the mundane and repetitive nature of handbook paintings in an industrialised economy.
“I imagine there is room for larger dialogue between art from South Asia and the Middle East. Both reflect an identical problems and given the geographic proximity, I believe there is a lot that may be achieved on curatorial ranges,” said Myrna Ayad, director of Art Dubai.
This dialogue between the Indian subcontinent and the Gulf was once also obvious within the textile installations of Swiss-Egyptian artist Karim Noureldin, an ordinary visitor to India. His two summary items had been made in collaboration with weavers in Jaipur and Panipat.
The other standout artist was once the forgotten overdue sculptor Piraji Sagara (1931-2014) from Ahmedabad. Sagara made putting geometric and summary wooden collages with burnt wood, beads, paint, sand and nails, using a blow torch.
A retrospective of 72-year-old Egyptian-Canadian artist Anna Boghiguian on the Sharjah Art Foundation captured scenes from her teach journeys via India and Nepal within the 1980s. There is a palpable influence of Rabindranath Tagore’s writings in her works.
“We wish to remain a meeting level for artists, gallerists, collectors, buyers and establishments from the Middle East, South Asia and North Africa,” said Ayad.
(The reporter travelled on the invitation of Art Dubai)
“Many employees requested me, ‘kaunsa company se’ (which company do you work for)?” Jain says. “The code symbolises a employee’s songs. To know its meaning, you need to talk to them,” she says. Over the following few weeks, she distilled the reports of Indian labourers via evocative works similar to Labour Card, which accommodates two stacks of bureaucracy used to mark attendance and dealing hours.
Her display, Burden of Proof, is likely one of the highlights of the 12th edition of Art Dubai, which ran from March 21 to 24 and featured 105 galleries from 42 countries. Jain is likely one of the 11 world artists selected for Art Dubai’s new non-profit Residents’ Programme. In many works, she channelled the emphasis on counting and numbering, especially in prayers, as a metaphor for the mundane and repetitive nature of handbook paintings in an industrialised economy.
“I imagine there is room for larger dialogue between art from South Asia and the Middle East. Both reflect an identical problems and given the geographic proximity, I believe there is a lot that may be achieved on curatorial ranges,” said Myrna Ayad, director of Art Dubai.
This dialogue between the Indian subcontinent and the Gulf was once also obvious within the textile installations of Swiss-Egyptian artist Karim Noureldin, an ordinary visitor to India. His two summary items had been made in collaboration with weavers in Jaipur and Panipat.
The other standout artist was once the forgotten overdue sculptor Piraji Sagara (1931-2014) from Ahmedabad. Sagara made putting geometric and summary wooden collages with burnt wood, beads, paint, sand and nails, using a blow torch.
A retrospective of 72-year-old Egyptian-Canadian artist Anna Boghiguian on the Sharjah Art Foundation captured scenes from her teach journeys via India and Nepal within the 1980s. There is a palpable influence of Rabindranath Tagore’s writings in her works.
“We wish to remain a meeting level for artists, gallerists, collectors, buyers and establishments from the Middle East, South Asia and North Africa,” said Ayad.
(The reporter travelled on the invitation of Art Dubai)
Indian artist captures lives of Dubai’s migrant workers
![Indian artist captures lives of Dubai’s migrant workers]()
Reviewed by Kailash
on
March 27, 2018
Rating:
