photo: KIOKU Keizo
Untitled (There is No Border Here)
| Artist | Shilpa GUPTA |
|---|---|
| Year | 2005-2006 /2011 |
| Material/ Technique | plastic tape |
| Size/ Duration | dimensions variable |
| Copyright Notice | © Shilpa GUPTA |
| Year of acquisition/ donation | 2012 |
| Description | Born in Mumbai, India in 1976. Lives and works there. Shilpa Gupta makes art that deals with the political and social problems facing India, engaging with such themes as ethnicity, religion, gender, and class. Using a wide variety of techniques and materials, she creates sculptures, installations, interactive media works, video works, and photographs. The texts that frequently appear in her works reflect the loss, anxiety, irritation, doubt, and desire that people experience. The critical but poetic messages conveyed by her works make a strong impression on the viewer. This work deals with the territorial dispute over the Kashmir region, a multinational issue involving India, Pakistan, and the People’s Republic of China which emerged in the early twentieth century and is still unresolved. The conflict between India and Pakistan has especially affected Gupta personally since her childhood, and this work critically examines the reality of the invisible boundary lines that separate these two nations. The yellow plastic tape printed with the simple statement, “There is no border here,” creates a paradoxical situation in which one area can be separated from surrounding areas by simply stretching a single strip of tape around it. This artificial method of clearly dividing the inside from the outside is used to maintain internal security and keep an area separate from different countries, religions, and cultures outside it that are regarded as unassimilable. As the world continues to become more complex in the current century, this work gives us a new awareness of the nature of the freedom and security that we believe in and the existence of imaginary borders. It can also be seen as an artistic expression typical of a new generation that attempts to overcome the misunderstanding, or lack of understanding, of conditions that arise through differentiation in a new way that does not involve violent conflict or resistance. |
NOTES
This Collection Data page contains the works and materials in the collection of 21st Century Museum of Contemporary Art, Kanazawa, as of April 1, 2018.
Artists are listed alphabetically by artist’s surname.
Works and materials by the same artists are listed according to the date of the work in principle.
Works whose dates are unidentified are listed at the end of each item. Some works are not listed according to the date of work due to their relations.
The data of works and materials are listed in order of title, production year, material/technique/form, dimensions, donor’s name, copyright holder and credit for photograph.
Dimensions are given by height (H) x width (W) in centimeters for plane work, and height (H) x width (W) x depth (D) in cm for 3-D work. Diameter (Ø) is used for circular work.
For the name of country or city, the name currently used in English is listed in principle.