Kolam (கோலம்)

PREVIEW: Friday 8 November, 6-9PM
EXHIBITION: 9 November 2024-15 February 2025
OPENING TIMES: Thursday - Saturday, 10AM-6PM, or by appointment.
WHERE: Gallery 1

Kolam is an exhibition, an action, a space, an exploration. Mimicking its namesake*, it acts as an invitation to Tamil women and marginalised communities to hold space and have voice within contemporary cultural production. Cross the threshold, Cross that line, defy the mythological man. Erase the kolam.  

This liminal space explores the plurality of Tamil women identity and Dalit identity, the contradictions, the poetics and the politics. It negotiates what we bring forward through the threshold, what we leave behind. It seeks the right to self-determine. How do I define my postcolonial Tamil identity? She takes multiple forms. They take multiple shapes.

The exhibition is a part of practice-led curatorial research by Raghavi Chinnadurai, supported by Primary’s Programme team. We are inviting artist Osheen Siva, artists Palanikumar, Hairunisha from Palani Studio, to define, redefine, subvert what their Tamil identity is or isn’t through various modes of engagement.

The research focuses on exploring the pedagogical possibilities of Kolam, indigenous South-Indian Tamil threshold design, and other embedded cultural practices in the Tamil community, as decolonial curatorial framework and methodologies. It also tries to formulate new non-Eurocentric curatorial and exhibitory methodologies, rooted on collaboration and co-creation, which could facilitate Tamil contemporary art, especially from women and young artists.  

*Kolam, the intricate rhythmic geometric patterns, is a South-Indian threshold, domestic art form drawn in front of houses every day using rice flour. It has been demonstrated to have mathematical, cosmological, musical and spiritual meanings beyond cultural and ritualistic history. It carries intergenerational, embodied cultural knowledge. Though emancipatory in some aspects, Kolam has also been a tool of subjugation. The project aims to work through these.

Raghavi’s role as an Associate Curator is funded by Art Fund support.

Access: This event will be located in our ground floor gallery space which has full level access from our main entrance on Seely Road. If you have any access enquiries please contact admin@weareprimary.org. 

For details about the exhibition, please email raghavi@weareprimary.org and check our website for updates.