Codes, Stitches and Handshakes
I work with the intangible contributions of community crafts in personal and social formations. In the project 'Codes, Stitches and Handshakes', my attempt is to create an intimate space for interactions, where energies/vibes communicate beyond words and visuals. The project space will explore the idea of ‘the value of physical (face-to-face) interactions in the digital age’.
The project invites viewers to a safe space. The therapeutic power of such intimate yet community spaces, where the repetitive slow act of hand stitching creates room for discussions. brings people closer and creates grounds for sharing stories and emotional purging. to embroider QR codes with simple cross stitches. Each QR code, upon scanning, links to a GIF collage, which potentially opens a discussion on the individuality in community and communal identities in the age of post-pandemic virtual meetings.
Rucha Kulkarni (Amsterdam, NL, and Pune, IN) is an artist whose works consider a public sphere as a space for participation, inspiration, and self-retrospection. Having a graduation in painting, her education in Indology and Art History, also contributes heavily to her works as she draws references from the same, while reading contemporary issues. Of her recent and significant projects, Quilt Culture, was a major microfinancing project in which the artist worked with godhadi craftsmen (quilters) from Pune Maharashtra, India. Simultaneously, forming grounds for intervening notions of traditions, female skill, labour, and rights, tokenism with respect to the same. And analysing the larger picture of survival in an overpowering consumerist society.
