Fragments of a Panorama

The organisation of the space

Upon entering the gallery, visitors are greeted by AI renditions of Indian classical dancers and an exhibition explanation. This is the only body of extensive text in the space. The film, displayed on a wood-framed screen, is based on decades-old footage of renowned Bharatanatyam performer Jayalakshmi Eshwar. The enchanting effect of the visuals is amplified by the room’s dark lighting and Murthovic’s electronic-carnatic soundscape, transporting the viewer into the world of Indo-futuristism. As the screens are placed in a diptych formation at the entrance, they strategically conceal the rest of the instalments, encouraging visitors to walk in a clockwise direction around the piece. There is a heightened sense of anticipation and excitement as the other art installations gradually come into view.

Immediately capturing visitor attention, and at the heart of the exhibition, is a panoramic screen spanning several meters, displaying a video projection titled ‘A Road to India 2079.’ This film overlays archival footage of colonial India with AI-generated images and is presented from the perspective of the exhibition’s protagonist Meenakshi, a cyborg archivist and Bharatanatyam dancer. In this world, a golden era of South Asian cyborgs is in decline and Meenakshi navigates an ancient and colonial Indian past as well as future advancements.

Another smaller diptych screen explains that Meenakshi is part of the M-series cyborgs and that 2035 was the watershed year marking their era of decline. Seated on cushioned wooden crates, visitors are thus immersed in a speculative future that has reimagined India's historical trajectory. Alongside the hypnotic, psychedelic visuals, the sheer scale of the display begins to blur the boundaries between reality and fiction.

This boundary blurs further in the XR experience where visitors embody the spirit of Meenaskshi and practice various mudras whilst interacting with physical and virtual cultural artefacts.

Visitors can then peer into a bioscope that also displays ‘A Road to India 2079’ providing a completely contrasting experience to the panoramic screen - from all-encompassing immersion to an intimate, individual viewing affair.

An interactive game, set on an island within Fortnite, with scanned museum artefacts, allows visitors to gain more insights into South Asain History.

VEENA: model no.12., an indo-futuristic sculptural instrument, sits on a glass table strategically highlighting a cyberpunk spine.

‘Seeing Is Believing’- The Role of AI in Imagined Futures

By combining traditional, distinctly South Asian, cultural heritages and futuristic, ‘globalised’ AI/XR technologies the artists present a fascinating and unique visual experience. This is my first time seeing a combination of these two motifs. Taking inspiration from futurism and intertwining it with India’s rich, colourful, vibrant cultural traditions, this exhibition creates something quite unique. The exhibition examines the relationship between mankind and biomechanics in an era of AI, imagining how systems of oppression would develop in a world where the commanders of power were sentient AI beings. However, by situating this idea in the historical context of colonial India, this exhibition explores how an AI system of oppression interacts with race, colonialism, and the destruction of the natural world - something which sets it apart from other exhibitions investigating dystopian futures. By centring South Asian motifs, the creators are reminding Western audiences of the growing dominance of Asian states in emerging technologies, like AI. While India is one of these states, China, Japan, and Singapore are also global leaders on this stage.

Artificial intelligence allows viewers to visually explore a ‘counterfactual’ history of the Indian subcontinent, delving into the possibility of imperialism driven by currently emerging technologies rather than Western nation-states seeking wealth. By contrasting the visuals of colonial pasts and speculative futures, ‘A Road to India 1979’ plays with historical timelines through a constant negotiation between the past, present and future. This is quite an effective way of challenging the linear narratives of history that are quite common in the public domain, inviting visitors to question ‘what if.’

Through manipulation of the senses, the creators are very successful at immersing visitors into this counterfactual reality. The scale and curvature of the screen displaying ‘A Road to India 2079’; the distance at which the visitor is seated; and the volume of Murthovic’s futuristic South Asian audios generate this submersion. With the Fortnite game, visitors are gifted a two-way connection with this imagined reality and have the opportunity to interact with historical and cultural knowledge (unfortunately, this was a little bit tricky to navigate and the scavenger hunt element of this was unclear, so it was difficult to get the most out of this instalment). XR technology takes the visitor experience to the next level as you literally enter this dystopian Indian landscape, blending the boundaries of physical and digital realities. Whilst artists and curators invite visitors to think critically about and challenge the possibilities of emerging technology, they also effectively show off its creative potential and beauty. It is difficult to come away from the exhibition unamazed.

Reconstructed Cultures - Which India Are We Imagining?

In 2079 Meenakshi is piecing together the ‘lost fragments of endangered dance, music, art, and architecture’ in this dystopian landscape. In this process of cultural reconstruction, I was drawn to questions about nostalgia, heritage, fabrication, and forgetfulness. By centring classical Indian dance forms, the exhibition pays homage to a cultural heritage that has distinctly South Asian origins. As cyborg beings perform this art form, the exhibition equally revives and integrates ancient practices into modern contexts. Technology plays a central role in both endangering and potentially saving various traditional practices. In a world where communities are far less bounded by geography and where digital and virtual spheres are becoming significant features in most of our lives, there is a potency and urgency to the questions around cultural evolution this exhibition is trying to raise.

Meenakshi highlights the danger that certain practices and cultural heritages will be lost to time in the face of rising technologies, but this prompted me to ask - how can communities revive lost pasts with fragmented evidence (a question that Historians are constantly grappling with). I noticed that certain features of the exhibition blurred the distinctions and specificities of various South Asian traditions. For example, In ‘A Road to India 1979’ the narration altered between Hindustani and Dravidian languages and no homage was paid to the specifically South Indian origins of the classical dance forms. I wondered if this was supposed to be a commentary around Meenakshi’s attempt to piece together various ‘lost’ fragments of a distant past or whether this ambiguous mixture of art and language was a celebration of South Asia’s numerous traditions. As this work is exhibited in London, I wonder how much a Western audience would pick up on this nuance and how differently it would be received in India.

Corporality and Sexy Robots

As visitors enter the exhibition, they are first greeted with the performance of Bharatanatyam by cyborg classical Indian dancers. Movement and corporality are key focal points in this exhibition, amplified particularly by the XR experience. By practising various mudras, visitors are not only physically engaging with this imagined world, but the exhibition itself demands a degree of bodily mastery to immerse oneself in the experience. It would be valuable for the exhibitors to consider how individuals with impairments and disablments might engage with the installations. This is particularly relevant as some people with disablements, such as those using advanced prosthetics, arguably have the most direct experience with the integration of technology and the human body - a central theme of cyborgism.

With Meenakshi as the protagonist, the centrality of classical dance, and the emphasis on corporality and movement, the exhibition draws attention to the female body. It is difficult to gauge whether the artists and curators sought to make particular commentary on gender in their work. I noted that all the female-presenting cyborgs were sensualised in a way that their male counterparts were not. Whilst there may inherently be some sensuality in Bharatnatyam (which the cyborgs subsequently embody) this classical dance style is primarily a form of storytelling that emphasises a range of emotions and expressions. And whilst Meenakshi was not hyper-sensual, other cyborgs (especially in the Echoes of a Cyborg film) conformed heavily to twenty-first-century female beauty standards - full, round breasts; flat stomachs; child-bearing hips; pretty, child-like faces etc. Sometimes this was particularly exaggerated. This is quite a typical trope in science fiction where a lot of work reproduces patriarchal perspectives by not critically engaging with gender. Even this imagined Indo-futuristic world, was not free of the ‘male gaze.’