What will survive of us...

I went along to the opening of the Asia Triennial on Friday night curated by friend and colleague, Alnoor Mitha. The event took place in the bowels of the Imperial War Museum North and alongside the relics of war and violence, the triennial with its subtitle of ‘conflict and compassion’ was entirely suited to such an forbidding space. 

Not being the most eloquent art critics, and having not yet seen the galleries all around Greater Manchester where much of the work is happening, I can only report being inspired by the great effort led by Alnoor and his always friendly team. Brilliant people.

My one disappointment is that the real gem of the show didn’t materialise. That was the physical presence of Iranian born, Afghan street artist and friend of Arts for Health, Shamsia Hassani who I had the pleasure of introducing to Alnoor last year. Her projected images in the space and large welcoming banners outside the museum only served to frustrate and amplify her absence.

Why was Shamsia not with us? Bureaucracy and maybe just a touch of hysteria on the part of the British High Commission, who oh so helpfully insist that for local Afghani's to travel to the UK they need to first travel to either Pakistan or India to obtain a visa! For someone teaching full time and being an artist of significance in Afghanistan, you’d think that some effort might have been made to make this happen more easily for her. An opportunity for British diplomacy to shine - lost! Shamsia, you were missed!

Separate to the curated works and sat amongst the weapons of war, was a dark and truly grizzly object - deformed steel girders from the ‘twin towers’ - like some exhausted brutalist giant in the corner. Compelling, and for my part, something that called out for me to touch it. I didn’t, because all the signs said not to. Would it have been disrespectful?  

Like some medieval tomb of long-dead lovers, rubbed smooth by a thousand patinating hands, to me, this monolith demands some physical connection. More than that, it uncomfortably conjoins the triennial with the bleakest aspects of humanity. What, I wondered, would sound-artists make of this, the most potent of objects? I imagined it ‘amped up’ with pickups and played to a silent auditorium, its various struts and disjointed spurs of metal caressed, stroked and plucked, raising up some deeper melancholic symphony. 

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