Ranbir Singh Kaleka

"In this work, a library of books stands improbably in a clearing in the forest, symbolising ‘a library of knowledge.’ A lion enters, becoming the guardian of this knowledge but also, representing a mythical, other-worldly creature of the imaginary. The lion is driven away as the library is set on fire. Finally, a young lion returns to the city that emerges from the ashes of the scene. Flowers rise from the burnt ground. In this visionary and poetic video artwork the ‘hidden atrocities’ that take place in this animated painting are suggested rather than explained. It becomes a statement about a collective destruction of the environment, and of generational knowledge and wisdom passed through centuries and across cultures for which we must all atone."

In Man with Cockerel the viewer's reverie is jolted by a montage of asynchronous sounds which struggle to attain verisimilitude and connect with the chimeric procession of events injected in the interstices left by the splintering pixels of the dissolving man. Sensory relief is afforded at the end of the loop, by the long silent lapping of waves on an empty screen.

"In this work, a library of books stands improbably in a clearing in the forest, symbolising ‘a library of knowledge.’ A lion enters, becoming the guardian of this knowledge but also, representing a mythical, other-worldly creature of the imaginary. The lion is driven away as the library is set on fire. Finally, a young lion returns to the city that emerges from the ashes of the scene. Flowers rise from the burnt ground. In this visionary and poetic video artwork the ‘hidden atrocities’ that take place in this animated painting are suggested rather than explained. It becomes a statement about a collective destruction of the environment, and of generational knowledge and wisdom passed through centuries and across cultures for which we must all atone."

In Man with Cockerel the viewer's reverie is jolted by a montage of asynchronous sounds which struggle to attain verisimilitude and connect with the chimeric procession of events injected in the interstices left by the splintering pixels of the dissolving man. Sensory relief is afforded at the end of the loop, by the long silent lapping of waves on an empty screen.