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Black Coal / White Cube
A Panel Discussion Exploring the Confluence of Art, Labour and the Mining Industry
Speakers
Coal is a combustible black rock—a remnant of past life that emerged from the depths of the earth, and brought limitless benefits to us. Jharkhand, with the largest known coal reserves in India, can be considered a microcosm of the contradictions that a coal-dependent society faces. Here, the mining industry has contributed to modern industrialisation and provided opportunities for employment, but it has also irreversibly damaged the environment.
To voice their protest against environmental degradation and exploitation, mining communities have resorted to sit-ins, strikes, and rallies. But there also exists a rich body of cultural expressions ranging from poetry and music to videos and performances that document their experiences. Entangled here is an expression of labourers in the mines, and the labour of the artist creating the work.
This event, a collaboration between a curator, a writer, a social scientist and artists, will shed light on the confluence between art and the mining industry.
This programme is funded by the Connections Through Culture: India-Wales grant scheme by the British Council, supported by Wales Arts International/Arts Council of Wales to develop co-created projects between artists, arts organisations and festivals in both India and Wales.
In collaboration with Science Gallery Bengaluru.
Speakers
Ronny Sen
Ronny Sen is a film director, screenwriter, and photographer based in Kolkata. His debut feature film Cat Sticks world-premiered in the competition section at Slamdance in 2019, and won a Jury award. He has directed television documentaries for BBC. He started his career as a photographer and has made two artist books, Khmer Din (2013) and End of Time (2016). He was invited to be an artist in residence in Japan by the Japan Foundation in 2013 and in Poland by the Polish Institute in 2016. He received the Getty Images Instagram Grant in 2016 for his work in the Jharia coal mines which were shown in his debut solo exhibition in 2018 titled, ‘Fire Continuum’ at gallery Tarq in Mumbai. His works are included in the permanent collection of the Alkazi Collection of Photography.
Shanthamani Muddaiah
Shanthamani Muddaiah is a visual artist who lives and works in Bangalore. She has a Masters of Fine Arts from M.S. University, Gujarat. Shanthamani’s practice is intimately linked to the physicality of the materials she employs. Charcoal, a material she frequently uses in sculptures and installations, signifies a connection to all that is primordial. The dark and porous carbon surface imbibes everything around and evokes death as well as reconstitution and renewal. In addition to recycling material, such as charcoal, she also makes use of familiar Western myths and endows them with new meaning through her work. She also received the Charles Wallace Fellowship in 2004, and the National Junior Fellowship from the Ministry of Tourism and Culture, New Delhi for 2006 – 2008.
Arnika Ahldag
Arnika Ahldag is the chief curator at MAP. As an art historian, she investigates the representation of labour in Indian contemporary art. As an artist she works in video and performance and her projects were shown at the Bhubaneswar Art Trail, the Kiran Nadar Museum of Modern Art and Max Mueller Bhavan, New Delhi. She co-founded the Feminist Syllabus, which is part of the workshop series Pact of Silence, How to break it, a programme for intersectional feminist discourses in the arts. She holds a Ph.D. in Visual Studies from the School of Arts and Aesthetics, JNU, and an MA from University College in London, UK and Albert Ludwigs University in Freiburg, Germany.
Dhiraj Kumar Nite
Dhiraj Kumar Nite (Dr, PhD) is a Social Scientist at Ambedkar University Delhi, India and a Senior Research Associate at the University of Johannesburg, South Africa. He specialises in the history of wellbeing, labour relations, and entrepreneurship. His PhD in Historical Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, is titled ‘Work and Culture on the Mines: An Indian Coalfield (Jharia) 1895-1970’.
He was a postdoctoral fellow at the Linnaeus University, Sweden, and the University of Johannesburg. Among his publications are ‘An Aspiration for a Civilised, Dignified and Human life: Sociability and Social Wellbeing in an Indian Coalfield‘ (2021), ‘Employee Benefits, Migration and Social Movement: An Indian Coalfield, 1895-1970’ (2019), ‘Negotiating the Mines: The Culture of Safety in the Indian Coalmines, 1895-1970’ (2019), ‘Consenting to Labour Appropriation?’: The Mineworker on South African Gold and Coalmines, 1951-2011’ (2017, with Paul Stewart), ‘Worshiping the Colliery-goddess: An Exploration of the Religious view of Safety in Indian coalminers, 1895-2009,’(2016), and ‘Life History and other Memories: The Mineworkers in Coalfield and Goldfield in South Africa, 1952-2012’(2014). Presently, he has been enquiring into the construction sector, skill development and wellbeing in nineteenth-century western India.
Shrabonti Bagchi
Shrabonti Bagchi is the senior editor with Mint Lounge and has been a writer and editor with
mainstream media publications for over 15 years. Shrabonti started out at The Times of India’s online venture, going on to work with prestigious print publications such as Business Standard and The Telegraph, where she wrote on business, personalities, lifestyle and social trends, design, culture and what was then the nascent startup environment. These were her focus areas in her next two jobs as well – at the DNA newspaper and with The Times of India’s Bangalore edition, where she worked in a senior editorial position. After five years at The Times of India, Shrabonti joined FactorDaily.com, a prestigious digital news website with a focus on technology, where she covered the intersection between technology and society/culture in India.
