GHAR (Home) is the collection of Video, photographs, photo-book, and paintings to dissect the meaning of ‘Ghar’ both as an idea and perception. A temporary living room of a middle class family in Dhaka is set up to reflect the parallel existence and the inbuilt tension between ‘home’ and the ‘world’. ‘Ghar’ is immediately confronted by ‘bahir’ in Bengali Literature, which can also be contemplated as the inner and outer world, ‘us’ and ‘them’.

If Ghar has imaginary walls, time, structure, power relations how memories are being constructed? Memories of shelter, hope, peace, sound, smell, belonging, love, humor, imagination, secrets, domestication, sex, immorality, violence, death?

The exhibition aims to address the psychological state or constructed impression of Ghar, how it is embedded in human consciousness as a private space and how does the interpretation of ‘private’ dislocate, when a public space turned into home.

Abir Shome’s ‘Lunar Landing’ shows how ordinary space and materials transform into extra territorial space. Afrida’s observation about conjugal life questions the institution of marriage and family. Hadi Uddin’s unconventional way of collaborating with people in a Rayer bazar, who are constantly in flux and are migrated in Dhaka for various reasons, illustrate the ephemerality of the concept. Shadman Shahid’s photographs demonstrate the brutal side of domestication, which is normalized and silenced. Sounak Das & Fahmida Mubin’s compilation of audio work from various viral videos offers us an illusory conversation between ‘ghar’ and ‘bahir’, virtual and tangible. 

Artists

Abir Shome, Afrida Tanzim Mahi, Hadi Uddin, Shadman Shahid, Sounak Das & Fahmida Mubin