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Chemical Smuggle: The Body Boxes

Sumedh Rajendran never fails to charm both in works and in person. The latest solo Chemical Smuggle slated to be held at Grosvenor-Vadehra, London, October, has the uncanny charm of philosophy and activism. JohnyML previews the works.

Sumedh Rajendran

Chemical Smuggle. Sumedh Rajendran’s solos have always intriguing titles like ‘Street-Fuel Blackout’, ‘Psuedo Homelands’ and so on. Now he is up with his latest solo show, ‘Chemical Smuggle’. Slated to open at Grosvenor-Vadehra Gallery, London in early October this show has Sumedh’s signature style works; but this time with a slight difference. He has used advertisement enamels in many of his works. Functioning between two levels of articulations, between desire and horror, these works featured in Chemical Smuggle invite multiple interpretations.

Sumedh, as he himself has said in interviews, is an artist activist. As understood generally, activism is a kind of personal mission, aligning itself with kinder groups and ideologies, for bringing about certain changes in the society. Though activism presupposes results at the other end, it is not necessary that activism bring about changes immediately as it expects. Sumedh’s activism, as an artist is not about generating a result, social change within a foreseeable future. He, in his works assumes the role of a commentator, mostly using ironic structures, puns of words and images, sarcastic inversions of meanings attributed to the local and available materials and a perennial regard for the milling masses in the streets. The artist, while detaching himself from the result oriented activism, places his artistic interventions as catalyst to the thought process that makes social changes possible and feasible.

Materials have never been the focal point of the artist and consistency is something that Sumedh always keeps out of his artistic process. Though, it might sound contradictory to those who have been observing Sumedh’s works for the last three years, the fact is that Sumedh attaches socio-historical values to the materials. It is not the materials that direct him to produce a particular works of art. On the contrary, the issues that he likes to deal with in his works, play a crucial role in the selection of the materials. Consistency is the other point that Sumedh defies though, we see a sort of consistency in his works, whether in the case of the images or in the case of the artistic concerns. Here again, the artist clears the clouds by saying that the notion of consistency is something that binds the artist to ‘style’ and renders him unproductive. What he demands is an artistic and conscious awareness about things.

Sumedh sticks to his ideological guns as he works. The apparent interest for certain materials like tin sheets, perforated iron sheets, leather etc., and also the interest in repeating forms and images tell the viewer that at least this artist is consistent in one thing; his humanist philosophy. The humanism of Sumedh stems from his migrant status in the world (not as a Keralite settled in Delhi but as a citizen exiled in geographical boundaries). Street, his philosophical crucible is the place where he derives his images from. For the first time, he has brought in the direct human violence in the repertoire of sculptures.

As seen in Stree-Fuel Blackout, Chemical Smuggle too has mutilated images of animals, especially donkey, pig and dog. There are the images of human beings who are forced into submission and also there are the images of bridges and architectural remnants. The work titled ‘People Paid’ sets the tone of the show. The brutal violence of man is what we see in the work. A man stabbing another helpless man. It is a cut throat world and Sumedh makes these men into dexterously created boxes. They are the migrants and cheap laborers, perhaps. They are forced to live their lives in packages. They carry their bodies as packets ready to be sent anywhere. They are ready to kill their fellow beings for a payment and with a shudder we realize that we all live in this society of migrants with the innate urge to kill. However, our bodies and minds are closely guarded secrets, both powerful in its secrecy and helpless in external agency. And their bodies are laminated, enameled advertisement sheets. They are repetitive, raw, unformulated and like the flickering images of a television program that makes the viewer to grapple with a reality that is not his own but forced to be reckoned as his.

In another work, two human figures, one apparently looks like a woman, and with the same bodily attributes as seen in ‘People Paid’ are seen in a domestic setting. It is the counter point of the previous work. If the one was happening in the street/public space the other is happening in the domestic/private space. Both the figures in this sculpture seem to be in harmony with each other and holding each other for support. At the same time, the enamel and packaged body, some how evoke the feeling that there is a contained violence in them, as seen in the domestic sphere; willing to explode at any time but held under check for the time being. The tension that both these works creates should be seen as the extremes in which the migrant human beings (or even anyone) are destined to live.

There is yet another work where a monumental human made up of packaged tin sheets standing and raising his one hand which is turning into a hollowed pipe. Most of the human beings represented (emblematically) here are monumental. A kind of iconicity is given to them by the artist. They are not the insignificant figures who add to the census. The individuality that the artist gives to the street mass is one of the key points of Sumedh’s sculpture, despite the eruptible violence that one sees in his works.

Referring to his own earlier works Sumedh reintroduces the mutilated animal figures as a part of the human images. These animals are the constant companions of the human figures, both in their aggressive and submissive postures. In another work, Sumedh sarcastically looks at the notions of progression and urbanization through the incorporation of rubber tyres into his works. The wheels become a part of the body, enabling and subjecting him at the same time. Though it could verge into the arena of cliché, Sumedh saves it with the grace of formal arrangement of the component figures.

The box like formulation plays a predominant role in the structural articulation of Sumedh’s works. One of the monumental works that he did early this year had a huge bridge (the Flyovers seen all over the world enabling the vehicular movement easier and make urbanization and globalization possible) made up of tin sheets converted into boxes that the migrant mostly use to transport their material possessions in their exodus from the villages to the cities. Sumedh’s works are alluring and desirous in their physicality. The artist has an uncanny flair for irony and sarcasm. He employs these capacities to articulate not only his works but also their titles.