Notes on work: Khoj Open Day

A series of new works have emerged. They have been presented at the Khoj Open Day, which was today! Now that they are 'done' I will share them on the blog soon. It was three small video pieces, three large prints, one of which was of a site specific installation also recreated at Khoj, and a series of photogrpahs on the economy of flowers and sinks. Meanwhile here is the note I shared today:-
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The current work in the month long residency, follows my engagement with the river Yamuna in New Delhi, from 2004 to 2006, which led to photo and text based work, Alien Waters, and the book Immersion. Emergence, in October last year.

My practice as an environmentalist and a photographer, has increasingly been rooted in my understanding of the self as part of a network of inter-related ecologies, or as a ‘personal ecology.’ Ecology is not an isolated term for me, but one which shows inter–relationships. The river to me is not a mere water body flowing through the city , but as part of a network of myriad types of relationships each based on an exchange of various sorts, including with myself. However it seems that the city is not only unaware of the river itself, it is now quite oblivious of the deep relationship that exist. It is also startling how this changes as the river passes through first rural than a highly urbanized Delhi. Vegetables, flowers, water, sand, sewage, junk, as well as a place for livelihoods, and of peace, quietude and tranquility, are all part of that exchange

Sites of Exchange: Flower fields and Sinks
On the river itself, the flower fields of the river are where people grow marigolds to make a livelihood. The beauty of the flower is its exchange value, which in turn supports a sustainable local economy. The river provides the natural soil fertility and the easily available ground water, along with its own land, the sandy riverbed, as a site for cultivation. One acre of land can yield over 15 tonnes of flowers, zafris, basanti and gaindas, in one 7 to 9 month long season of flowers. The flowers are grown and plucked by family and relatives and sold mostly in the Fatehpuri mandi in Old Delhi. Here, one of the largest retail flower markets in North India, tonnes of flowers are sold each morning in a matter of a few hours. From here they travel to temples, homes, onto truck bonnets as garlands, or as adornments in weddings and religious rituals. Often they land up back in the river as decaying garbage and debry.

Simultaneously the city uses water from the river and throws it back as sewage. Each tap and water basin is almost literally connected to the river waters. While the river bemoans a ‘dirty and polluted’ river, it is unconscious of its own role in making it so. Over 3000 million liters of sewage finds its way into the river from sinks, bathtubs, sewerage pipes etc.. each day.

The local economy of the land is based on the fertility of land. However the price of land in the city is changing the economy around that sustenance. Land near Wazirabad, (near the flower fields) even though being part of the sandy ‘river bed,’ is now priced at over 3 lakh rupees an acre as demand for ‘new’ land sours in the dense city. Selling it could make more money than growing flowers or vegetables might. The ‘fertility of capital’ overtakes the ‘fertility of land.’ The riverbed is increasingly being acquired for building stadiums, large temples and now the Commonwealth Games village. Land and ecology are inseparable, as is the relationship between the ecology of nature and of the ‘self.’ The changing ecology of the flower fields is the crumbling ecology of the ‘self’ in these times. The script seems to be prewritten. The river is timeless. The river is dead.