00:00I don't know who lives near this house, I don't know who lives in this house
00:14Four of us are in Gaba, me, Dimanshu, Ritu Sridhi, Raviul Khan and Subhashik Modi.
00:32Currently we are building and it's in the process of making, we are making a space named
00:40The Bengal Biennale for the first time is happening, so it's in Shantiniketan right
00:44now, later it will be in Kolkata.
00:47Particularly this project, the Kathar Ghor, we are collaborating with nearly 100 women
00:52Katha makers of Birbhum.
00:54They are home makers and these women have a long tradition and history of knowing Katha
01:01from their memories of their grandmothers, mothers and generational knowledge that they
01:07have.
01:08The basic intention was to create a space, a platform where these collective voices of
01:16artists and artisans coexisting in a space that can come together in a more louder approach.
01:23It is also a gesture of giving care to something, so we totally covered up our entire house
01:34from the outside with the Kathas made by these women, where they have stitched their
01:39own narrations, own stories and autobiographies.
01:42Also, we were looking at the constant question that how this ownership of these houses or
01:50the ownership of land is changing and how the locals are being limited to accessing
02:01the lands that they previously had a lot more access to.
02:06So, basically it is a question of the ownership.
02:09We are staying in this place as a rent.
02:12They are also looking at it from another perspective.
02:16So, whose is the house?
02:18So, basically we have covered it up with a question of the ownership.
02:23So, everyone can come and interpret it according to them.
02:27So, the basic idea is to build up a pedagogical site where throughout this term of this binalay
02:33we will have different types of engagements like workshops and presentations.
02:39So, we are up to a platform where mutual learning is the main purpose.
02:47You can also see different fragments in this house as five of us stay in here.
02:54So, you might see that things are kept as it is.
02:57So, how to share our living space within this limited access?
03:02Actually, the work that you have seen right now might change after 20 days or might not.
03:10We have initiated this process since April.
03:15So, we are continuously thinking about why Shantiniketan?
03:21Why not another place?
03:23So, we have seen that from the term of Rabindranath and after Vishwavarti.
03:28So, we have many different aspects to deal with Vishwavarti or we can engage with
03:35or we can find many resources from there or we can collaborate with everyone.
03:40So, actually the Bengal binalay is also happening in Shantiniketan.
03:44It also adds to that culture of you said about the tourism or the other side.
03:54As Rabindranath said that the world, Vishwavarti is a nest where the world comes together.
04:02So, we believe in that idea and we are also open up globally.
04:11Katha is a tool.
04:13We are not talking about the history of katha or the process of katha making.
04:18Katha is a tool where a conversation can be made.
04:21Where women can speak about themselves in a sharing space.
04:25I thought that there can be a story in katha making.
04:28So, I started studying a landscape from there.
04:31How can I know a landscape through a voice or an autobiography?
04:36As you mentioned the idea of preservation.
04:39So, I think before preservation something has to be shared first.
04:43After sharing and after its existence out there,
04:49then it is something that needs to be preserved for the later generation to access it or see it.
04:56So, from that note we were going into this idea.
05:02And along with that we were also going into the gesture that someone asks to tell something about yourself.
05:11That question remains always something that is not very comforting from very fast.
05:18Even if someone asks me right now, I will not be very prompt about it.
05:23So, that question was something that led them to take a moment and think that what is it.
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