Unruly Iris of Dissent (U.I.D 2)
Shown at: ‘Archeology of the self: Archives, Anarchives & the Artist‘, Art Heritage Gallery, New Delhi (2023)

Projection of Video Loop

12 years after The Untold Intimacy of Digits (2011), which animated a nineteenth century Bengali peasant’s handprint found in a London archive into a spectral count towards infinity, Raqs return to bodily scans as arguments with surveillance. Now, in 2023, The Unruly Iris of Dissent, magnifies a restless iris to continue its debate with the U.I.D (Unique Identification Database) that lies at the heart of the ‘Aadhar’ system that aims to turn every person resident in India into a number. It does so as an immersive digital projection that looks eye-to-eye with the power that wants to look a little too closely at human bodies.

In every sum figured by power, a remainder haunts the calculation. Not everything adds up. A people are never equal to a listing, or count, of their bodies. They are something more and something less than a population.
Video Still
Video Still

Swamp & Marsh
Shown at: ‘Archeology of the self: Archives, Anarchives & the Artist‘, Art Heritage Gallery, New Delhi (2023)| ‘Come Undone’, Frith Street Gallery (2024)

Prints on Hahnemuhle slickrock metallic paper, diptych
1m x 1m

Eyes are waterbodies. They are a perimeter where the boundary between self and landscape is opened. This fluid argument, begun in video, in Unruly Iris of Dissent, is continued on paper, with Swamp and Marsh.

Marsh, Print (1 x 1 m)
Swamp, Print (1 x 1 m)
Also see: Delta