“Draghima Dithyrambic”
Abhishek Hazra and Jacqui Shelton
30 May → 13 June 2018

Draghima Dithyrambic is a project about the traffic of ideas between the art world and academia with respect to questions around race, identity and the colonial legacy, and about the performance of intellectual/academic history in the art world. It builds upon Abhishek’s ongoing interest in colonial histories and the politics of knowledge. Riffing off the histories of various inhabited spaces including West Space, the old Commonwealth Bank building, the Victorian College of the Arts, the Victorian Barracks, the Temperance Hall, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, Draghima Dithyrambic will attempt to trace new affinities between conflicted understandings of those spaces within the context of postcolonial discourse. Consuming, borrowing, reordering and subverting the audience’s understanding of their contexts, Hazra’s work will create layers of fiction and alternative meaning as a way to enact institutional critique but also create a space for multiple knowledges and readings.

Broken into three chapters, Draghima Dithyrambic will include an introductory talk, and two performances (the Cantos) that will each be followed by a response and then an open workshop discussion. Canto 1: the foot soldiers of re-presence at VCA will include a durational performance whereby Abhishek will attempt to write down all the footnotes in the twelve volumes of Subaltern Studies, as an ironic play on the expanded notion of the ‘Subaltern’. At the Temperance Hall, Canto 2: the compradors consume their amnesia will be a shorter performance that attempts to explore the vexed question of internal colonisation. The workshops that follow each performance will have a Raymond Williams style approach to ‘keywords’ as the framework to collaborative conversation — thinking through significant words/texts/events that have a lasting influence in the cultural conversation around post-coloniality and decolonisation.

This first series of talks, performances and workshops in Melbourne will lead to the creation of a new video work, a publication, and ongoing discussions. Those interested in engaging with these ideas, and connections between India and Australia are encouraged to attend either all or part of the program above, and be part of this conversation. All welcome!

Public Program

Draghima Dithyrambic: an introduction

Wednesday 6 June, 6pm, West Space, Collingwood Yards. Artist talk with Abhishek Hazra and Kelly Fliedner.

Canto 1: the foot soldiers of re-presence

Thursday 7 June, 12:30pm, The Stables, VCA, Southbank Campus, University of Melbourne. Durational performance, response and open workshop.

Canto 2: the compradors consume their amnesia

Friday 8 June, 2:30 pm, Temperance Hall, South Melbourne. Durational performance, response and open workshop.

Draghima Dithyrambic was supported by the Australian Government through the Australia Council.