alterbodies
Alterbodies is not an alternate experience, but my own physical, spiritual, mystical and intellectual unison with the universe.
‘Alterbodies’ explores my positioning in form, structure and design through the tenuous link of trying to represent the body through the miniscule cellular experience to a holistic one.
Alterbodies is an exploration the alternative possibilities of one’s body. Over the ages, feminists and the like have always written, painted and spoken only up till female sexuality. But for me, I am trying to go beyond these and explore the infinitesness of sexuality and the body at large…and there is no differentiation between male and female genders and that all things eventually converge. Also that the realization that all these elements originated in the Indian philosophies of science and living and what we see and hear around are all reflections of these.
In Alterbodies, I hinged my own body as an artefact. These are a series of autobiographical works based on women and nature, women and reality, emancipation series, women archetypes, mother archetypes and Navagraha series
From my previous Archetypal Series, I evolved into Alterbodies. I started the series with fleshless structures of skulls, bones and skeletal frames. In 2008, I started drawing a series of skulls, which was part of my own lighter form of existence. I fleshed out the skull with my own being by partially filling out the eyes, ears and sockets and cavities. From there, I progressed to a complete skeletal frame by fleshing out my face. Slowly I started fleshing out the skeletal structures of my limbs and other parts of my body as if in an artistic and ritualistic trance.
Our body intelligence awakens with the memory of our cells. Every mystery of nature becomes a sensory and mystical experience for the body. Every cell opens its eyes to the sensations of the universe- the faint flutter of the butterfly wings, the gentle fall of a raindrop, etc, are felt at various levels of experience. The fleshly body becomes an illusion which is at times awakened to reality by the syncing of pulsations of a million cells.
Another important transformation which happened to me during my experience of the Alterbodies series was the fact that I was intuitively drawn towards Indian philosophy, which remains the seminal node of my work. The change was almost part of my body intelligence and biological perception working in tandem, as my readings intertwining my work became the raw experience of what I am, and what I became and what I will be. There was an intuitive connection with Indian philosophy which unearthed layers of biological, physical and intellectual experience of life.