In Akash Kalo Megh (Shadows in the Sky), Protick Sarkar excavates the circadian image, steeped in the minor durations that comprise the weft of biographical time—all the works on display germinate in his hometown of Dhaka, in the radius of the neighbourhood he has always lived in. Under the Dhaka sky, familiar images ripple against all that is altering at the speed of capital, scenes unfurl in lento in his mother’s home where time is not bent to history and tenderness and resilience abide, and in the prescient gaze of crows that move seamlessly from domestic architraves to the vast sky.
Drawing from the reservoir of lived time, Akash Kalo Megh dwells between the observed and that which escapes being known, the image and its ineluctable unconscious, the drenched sky and the light which arrives after the rain.
key data
- Venue
- Fotohof
- Date
- 7. 8. 25, 7 p.m.
Sarker Protick
Sarker Protick has developed a practice that combines his roles as an image-maker, a teacher and – infrequently – a curator. His often minimal, suspended and atmospheric visuals are coherently open with vast and solemn distance. Working with photography, video and sound, Protick’s works are built on long-term surveys rooted in Bangladesh and the larger region of Bengal. The form and materiality of his works often morph into the physicality of time – its raptures and our inability to grasp or hold time, the process of image-making as the way to expand time. Here we don’t experience time as moving in a straight line, but rather experience it slowing down, recurring, having dips and curves, at times being in a state of constant flux.
Protick studied at the South Asian Media Institute – Pathshala in Dhaka, where he has also been teaching for the past ten years. Protick is a co-curator of Chobi Mela, the longest running international photography festival in Asia. His work has received multiple awards and recognitions, including Joop Swart Masterclass, Foam Talent, Light Work Residency, Magnum Foundation Fund, World Press Photo Award, and others. Protick is represented by Shrine Empire in Delhi.
Website
Exhibitions
Solo exhibitions (selection)
2024 Awngar, C/O Berlin.
2024 Spaces of Separation, Bristol Photo, Bristol (UK).
2022 Nirobodhi (Till Time Stands Still): Sarker Protick, Shrine Empire, Delhi.
2019 Of River and Lost Lands, Impact Doc, Amsterdam.
2016 What Remains, Latvian Museum of Photography, Riga.
Group exhibitions (selection)
2024 11th Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art, Brisbane (AU).
2024 Jameel Art Center: At the Edge of Land, Dubai (UEA).
2024 Asia Now Paris, Paris.
2023 Art Jameel: At the Edge of Land, Hayy Jameel, Riyadh.
2023 Synesthetic Notations, Serendipity Art Festival, Goa (IN).
2023 To Enter The Sky, Dhaka Art Summit, Dhaka.
2021 32nd Singapore International Film Festival (SGIFF), Singapore.
2020 Afterglow, Yokohama Triennale, Yokohama (JP).
2020 Nach uns die Sintflut, Kunst Haus Wien, Vienna.
2020 Related Realities, Backlight Triennale, Tampere (FI).
2019 Stories of Earthly Survival, Ci.CLO Biennial, Porto (PT).
2018 Temporary Certainty, 4A Centre for Contemporary Asian Art, Sydney (AU).
2018 Breaking Point, Triennale der Photographie, Hamburg (DE).
2018 Relics, Singapore Art Week, Singapore.
2017 Chobi Mela Photo Festival IX, Dhaka.
2016 Daegu Photo Biennale, Daegu (KR).
2015 Quai de la Photo Biennale, Paris.
2012 Noorderlicht Photo festival, Gronigen (NL).
