Palimpsest

Arunanshu Chowdhury
2005

Texts: Shukla Sawant


Functioning as a palimpsest of images, often dream-like in their appearance, the paintings slip and slide between reality, memory and fantasy. Furthermore, the twin devices of superposition and condensation become a way of deepening memory whereby sometimes certain objects of no significant consequence take on greater meaning than the main subject of representation. Denying the erasure of any experience, he uses his eye, not as a tool of seeing but as a means to know, rather it is used to mediate and reflect on the possibilities of the image as a precipitation of experiences. Achieving a comfortable integration of recollection and flights to the imagination, the images then acquire a metaphorical presence.


(excerpt from the catalogue essay by Shukla Sawant)