Goan artist Rai shines through her works on coastal wetlands at Kolkata exhibition

The moment we entered the Experimenter-Hindustan Road, what struck us was the ambience. The dimly lit lights focusing only on the artworks, the unique installations and a video on loop made us feel as if we were in the middle of the wetlands itself. But what helped us decode the theme and the artworks was the presence of the artist. We spoke to Rai on her exhibition, Fever, curated by Bhasha Chakrabarti and discovered it through her eyes.

Here’s what is intriguing about the ongoing exhibiton Fever by Rai at Experimenter-Hindustan Road

On display as part of the experimenter’s Artists for Artists program, the exhibition narrates a work in progress through images, texts and visual installations.  The artworks reflect broader themes like movement, inheritance, belonging and becoming, exploring ways of how one notices, absorbs, and relates to the world around them. Three of the major works include Fever, Search Party and Ngan & Nilnil.

Being asked about how the landscape of Goa influenced her works, she mentions, “It’s not just the charm of Goa that influences, there is a lot of destruction and land issues also. My whole work is drawn from there. It is rooted in this landscape of coastal reclaimed wetlands. They have a very long and interesting history of being managed by the community instead of a single-person ownership. I got really interested in this model because we don’t get to see that a lot. I started documenting them focusing on how people maintain them and what’s happening around.”

Interestingly, many of her artworks are not only engaging to look at but also interactive as it requires a UV light to flash on the canvas to reveal something more artistic than meets the eye at first.

Curious we decided to delve deeper into the name of the exhibition – Fever. She complied with our curiosity by saying, “It is a pause where your body is changing. It encounters something foreign and is creating anti-bodies. But it’s also a state where you negotiate with all things new which could be good or bad. Also, one of my work-series on display is called Fever; but as a whole, it has that quality of something in-between movement.”

Many of the artworks are on the basis of serious research and observation. She comments, pertaining to each of the two must-have qualities in an artist. “Observation is more like being a listener. Wherever you are going, without projecting too much of yourself, you try to understand what is going on around you. Artistic research is not just reading books or going through text materials. You are also going to places and interacting. How you are perceiving things is also a part of research.”

She signs off by mentioning that in the year ahead, she would like to make more artworks and "is really excited” about an artist residency she would be participating in. Talking about the wetlands which formed the basis of her exhibition she says, “I am interested in having a longer engagement with these landscapes. Even if I move out of Goa in the future, this is a place I want to keep coming back to.”

Fever is an ongoing exhibition at Experimenter-Hindustan Road till June 14, 2025