Amar Kanwar: The Scene of Crime

Amar Kanwar’s films and multi-media works explore the politics of power, violence, and justice. His multi-layered installations originate in narratives often drawn from zones of conflict and are characterized by a unique poetic approach to the personal, social, and political. In this talk, Kanwar will present his learnings, doubts, and inadequacies in dealing with evidence of violence through artistic practice. He will demonstrate how, as he navigates through various scenes of crime, both in the context of India and internationally, he responds to and comprehends traces of violence using images, sound, and text.
Imagine the morning newspaper, headlines in couplets, black and white but in verse. Imagine that constellation of words. Truth as told by the stars and birds. Translated by bread and transcribed by daughters.

Imagine the clash of silences, the sting and honey of the bee, and the lamenting obituary. 
Imagine night as day and day as night, the moon as witness, and the sun as a doctor. Nurses as editors, poets as reporters, and the village balladeer the week’s ombudsman. Imagine traitors as lovers, outlaws as fathers, and renegades as poets.

Imagine talking curtains and storyteller tiffin boxes. Imagine columns becoming cups and rows becoming dogs. Mountain dogs, river dogs, factory dogs, gutter dogs, tree dogs, and kitchen sink dogs. 

Imagine the color of that grey.
Imagine the formal presentation of poetry as news of the day.
Imagine the formal presentation of poetry as evidence in a future war crimes tribunal.

Amar Kanwar
Amar Kanwar lives and works in New Delhi, India. His multi-award-winning work traces the legacies of globalization, decolonization, land use and border rights, environmental concerns, human rights, freedom of expression, and sexual violence. Interwoven throughout these inquiries are desperate narrative structures that ground his philosophical investigations. Through installations incorporating moving images, literature, poetry, and music, Kanwar creates meditative works that do not aim to represent trauma but to work through it.