When does one truly begin to understand art and not just pretend but genuinely connect with the stories it tells and the power it holds? And does it matter whether one belongs to the art world or not?
These questions arose when I found myself, almost incidentally, stepping into curating as an architect, a beautiful stumbling upon, as I see it. Through the Immerse fellowship I had just completed, I encountered a rich circle of thinkers, feelers, and creative activists who use art as a tool for political, emotional, and intellectual engagement, something I hadn’t fully grasped as someone outside the art world.
Still learning and eager to grow, I found myself two months later, in June 2025, at Bikaner House in Delhi, attending the inaugural exhibition of Gallerie Splash’s curatorial fellowship, where “I, We, Them,” curated by fellow Priyanka Sil, left a lasting impression. One of my close friends from Immerse, Anup Let, who was also exhibiting, had kindly introduced us.
Her practice is based off curatorial care and is a product of engagement over many years with her fellow artists’ practices. In I, We, Them, she explored themes of identity, collectivity, and authorship. While topics such as queer identity, shrinking communities, shifting geographies, and discrimination are increasingly visible in the arts today, what made Priyanka’s exhibition stand out was its sincerity. There was no curatorial posturing or over-intellectualizing, which one could figure out as soon as they entered the space.
Before confronting these issues head-on, Priyanka created a space where the artists felt safe to be vulnerable and allowed them to explore their practices in depth, both professionally and personally. This intimacy was visible in the exhibition, where elements from the artists’ everyday lives became part of their installations. In Awdhesh Tamrakar’s In Place of the Hammer, 2025, for instance, the hammer highlights both his lineage and a fading cultural memory. The name “Tamrakar,” derived from the Sanskrit words tamra (meaning copper) and kar (meaning maker or worker), used to symbolize a proud tradition of craftsmanship, has now increasingly been reduced to just a surname. Similarly, in Farhin Afza’s Dastarkhwan (Let’s Carry the Forgotten Stories), 2025, pieces of her family’s heirloom cutlery were placed on a hand-painted Kafan cloth, along with dialogue texts on the plates, bringing to life personal conversations and moments that might have taken place during the information blackout and night curfews following the abrogation of Article 370 in Kashmir in 2019 and its aftermath.
Anup Let’s space was close-quartered and warm, entered by parting a curtain, one of his own works. Inside was a domestic setting, shaped by his practice and reflecting the often-unseen folds of queer life. Visitors could sit on the mattress, read books Anup reads, or open drawers, revealing mirror-lined boxes with reflective prompts, literally and metaphorically unlocking one’s own life. Outside, the same room was shown live on a TV, a sharp curatorial gesture pointing to the constant surveillance we live under through phones, data, and targeted ads. Tied with an Aadhaar card reinterpretation, it questioned how identity is shaped by gender, religion, or marital status and made me reflect on my own privilege and how profiling, though not always visible, persists and shapes lives in ways we can’t always control.
The concluding room offered a dreamlike entrance to a further intimate and packed space, with Rucha Kulkarni’s Bonds per Stitch, a participatory quilting project engaging migrant women like herself to reclaim space through memory, dialogue, and shared labour. Across, Sriparna Dutta’s Weaving the Past: Memories of Marginalised Childhood (2024) is based on the concept of Kantha, a traditional Bengali quilt stitched from old clothes, often a mother’s sari, to offer the child comfort and familiarity. The work wove in old clothes and memories of her and her sister’s childhood, alongside conversations from her caregiving work with marginalised children.
Katharina Holstein-Sturm’s I Shed My Skin to Become Me featured stitched pages from her sketchbooks, which were cryptic, intimate, and collected over years, articulating a woman’s journey throughout her life, which she found it hard to part from. Some carried scribbled notes, book cutouts, or writings behind them. On the opening day, I had noticed a gap but refrained from walking through, assuming distance was expected. Later, Priyanka shared how children had discovered hidden messages behind it and encouraged me to do the same, describing it as stepping into Katharina’s hidden vulnerability that she chose to share, which was quite moving.
The exhibition cannot be judged by spatial design alone but also by the artworks that Priyanka had carefully selected, some of which
were deeply personal and some being off-series pieces that she had fought hard
to include. Two works that stood out for me were Debosmita Samanta’s Stay in my memory - I (2024), a personal
favorite that used specific color palettes to narrate stories tied to her Bari - a matrilineal clan within the
Tuluva community and Maya Mima’s Our
Genealogy (Kimono), where the kimono was stitched from their grandmother’s
saree, using Maya’s own hair as thread, which was once long. The selection and
the stories behind each work, and the way they were brought together, gave this
exhibition its depth and why it strongly stayed with me. Ever since, my respect
for Priyanka has grown. As a curator myself, I’ve come to value how undefined
our role often is and how it can be seen as an add-on at times. Yet, the way she wove
together so many practices with care while doing justice to each and shaping
the visitor’s experience is the kind of curatorial work I hope to learn from
and carry forward in my own capacity.
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