"Someone Else" Exhibition By Shilpa Gupta

Upstair in the Arnolfini Gallery is the first major solo exhibition of the artist Shilpa Gupta. Gupta creates artwork using interactive video, websites, objects, photographs, sound and public performances to probe and examine subversively such themes as desire, religion, notions of security on the street and on the imagined border. When you first enter into the show, you are presented a wall of shelves holding book covers made of metal. The piece is based around  100 books that have been written by either anonymously or under a pseudonym. The books are a mixture from around the world, different centuries and other cultures.the authors of the books hide there real names for many different reason, ranging from fear of imprisonment to simply thinking a different name would seel the book better. The work looks in to social, political dialogue of discrimination and understanding individuality.

The second room contains a piece called Singing Cloud. A large cloud shape made out of 4000 microphones. The microphones have been changed so instead of recording sounds, they emit a soundtrack made out of fragments of speech, that ripple and 'sing' across the works surface. Also in the room is a flap-board, used traditionally to announce arrivals and departures. The board displays short sentences that change every few seconds. The flap-board symbolises the numbers of the people migrating and those lost in this movement.

Within the third room is two other pieces of work, one a series of photographs and the other a wall with tape stuck directly to it creating a flag with text. The photographs show her in military style clothing doing many different poses, creating gun shapes or covering her eyes and mouth with her hands. These images reflect the violence in the world and the repression of knowledge. The tape flag created out of yellow tape symbolises nationhood, however along the tape is printed "there are no borders here". The piece brings forward the ideas of both physical and psychological division between people simply because of where they live.

The text on the flag says:
I TRIED VERY HARD TO CUT THE SKY IN HALF, ONE FOR MY LOVER AND ONE FOR ME. BUT THE SKY KEPT MOVING AND CLOUDS FROM HIS TERRITORY CAME INTO MINE. I TRIED PUSHING IT AWAY, WITH MY BOTH HANDS, HARDER AND HARDER BUT THE SKY KEPT MOVING AND CLOUDS FROM MY TERRITORY WENT INTO HIS. I BROUGHT A SOFA AND PLACED IN THE MIDDLE, BUT THE CLOUDS KEPT FLOATING OVER IT. I BUILT A WALL IN THE MIDDLE, BUT THE SKY STARTED TO FLOW THROUGH IT. I DUG A TRENCH, AND THEN IT RAINED AND THE SKY MADE CLOUDS OVER THE TRENCH