Saturday, November 14, 2009

Modes of Enquiry

Currently I am involved with:

Walking Lahore as psychogeographical derivé. Starting at the Ganda Nala on Zafar Ali Road, Gulberg.

Working with Lawrence Gardens, Bagh-e-Jinnah.
Had an initial walk through the park on an exceptionally drab smoggy day. Met with head mali Alam and his staff and borrowed plans of the park and other parks of Lahore.

The People's Art and Historical Project.
A collaboration with Adnan Madani, Karachi/London.
We are working on several new versions of the People's Art Historical Garden Centre Project, that was performed to good effect at the opening of Greynoise's recent showing on 25th October 2009, entitled "Patrons of Oh My God, I can afford Art".

Beginning work on my dissertation "The Post-Colonial Garden as a Palimpsest".
Busy reading. Recently finished K. Helphand's "Defiant Gardens", much else to write up here.

MANUFACTURER OF " " ROAD BLOCKER " " in KARACHI LAHORE ISLAMABAD PAKISTAN , WE ALSO MADE TURNSTILE GATES & REMOTE CONTROLL GATES IN PAKISTAN -NOW WE CAN STOP A BOMBER TRUCK WHO IS TRYING ENTERING & BLOW THE WHOLE BUILDING FROM HIS TRUCK .

100 % MADE IN PAKISTAN , IMPORTED SYSTEMS ARE EXPENSIVE WE ARE DIRECT MANUFACTURER IN PAKISTAN , INSTALLATION , AFTER SALES & SERVICES IS EASY FOR ALL OVER PAKISTAN CUSTOMERS -EASY SMOOTH OPERATION OF OUR OWN MADE SYSTEM IS AVAILABLE AT HALF PRICE THEN IMPORTED SYSTEMS -WE ARE DIRECT MANUFACTURER OF FORCED FULLY HARD STOP" " ROAD BLOCKER " "WE ALSO MADE - TURNSTILE GATES & REMOTE CONTROLL GATES , IN PAKISTAN - SEE OUR OTHER ADDS HERE -

NOW WE CAN STOP A BOMBER TRUCK WHO IS TRYING TO ENTERING & BLOW THE WHOLE BUILDING - WE CAN STOP THAT BASTARD -

OUR EQUIPMENT IS REALLY A LIFE SAVING EQUIPMENT -SAVE ASSETTS =SAVE PEOPLES LIVES -SAVE EGO -2 TYPES WE MANUFACTURED -A) MANUAL CONTROLLED -B) HYDRAULIC CONTROLLED -JUST 1 SECURITY GUARD IS ENOUGH TO CONTROLL THIS GATE -ONLY IMPORTANT BUILDING CHIEF SECURITY OFFICERS LETTER HEAD ENQUIRIES WILL BE ENTERTAINED -WE ARE THE ONLY 1 MANUFACTURER IN PAKISTAN & WE USE BEST SYSTEM TO EJECT & RELEASE THE SYSTEM -






Tuesday, November 3, 2009

Studio check-in 1st Nov. 2009.

Some current thoughts and initiatives.


Walking the ganda-nala’s of Lahore

I have approached a potential collaborator for this venture and we are in the process of discussing it. The open storm drains in this massive city of 7+ million (1998 census figures) provide the only channeling of sewage from homes to its ultimate discharge in the now dead river Ravi. There are no treatments plants. However the ganda-nala’s also create ecological corridors through the city where plant and animal life is left fairly undisturbed. The current heightened tension in the city is making any walking venture deeply problematic, let alone undertaking a walk through a highly suspicious no-mans land. I hope to undertake an initial walk (and documentation) within a few weeks.


The People’s Art Historical Garden Centre Project

Completed 25th October 2009 in collaboration with Adnan Madani. We have collaborated on several projects previously, notably “The Frankfurt School” video which is also covered in previous blog entries. See the newly added page of documentation and narrated video. Akbar Naqvi’s book “Image and Identity” (Oxford, 1997) is systematically dismantled and converted into useful paper bags. It is unbound and liberated from it’s burden of assumed authority. A reclamation, a reinterpretation and dissemination. Even an insemination (seeds are added to each art-historical bag). Like seeds themselves it is finally disseminated to the public of Lahore.


Eden project

I have yet to locate specialist input for this project and I now see it as being a much longer term initiative. I hope at least part of it may be realized by next summer’s residency.


Berlin Collaboration 2009-2010

I have sent out initial emails towards this collaboration. It is intended that a dual project be negotiated that comes to fusion and fruition in Berlin next summer. Something that involves horticultural practices in the cities of Lahore and Berlin.


Readings, recent and in progress, 1st Nov. 2009

Tim Richardson. Vista, The Culture and Politics of Gardens.

K. Helphand. Defiant Gardens.

Khan. The Gardener.

Ian Sinclair. Hackney that Rose-Red Empire.

Reza Aslan. How to Win a Cosmic War.

Charles Darwin. The Formation of Vegetable Mould.

Foucault. Several Readers and The Order of Things.

Isenberg. The Nature of Cities.

Belting. Garden of Earthly Delights.

Jellicoe. The Landscape of Man.

Coverley. Psychogeography.

Reynolds. On Guerrilla Gardening.

Allen. Kipling Sahib.

Solnit. As Eve Said to the Serpent.

Driver. Nash. Landing.


Research

I will be contacting Kenneth Helphand for my research on the ”Post-Colonial Garden”. This is currently under negotiation with my mentor concerning it’s whole approach to the subject.

Sunday, November 1, 2009

"P.A.H.G.C.P."

A collaborative project with Adnan Madani, in Karachi. We also collaborated last year on the video work, "The Frankfurt School". Here we again made use of the skills of Mahmood the book-binder.

This is the most recent completed project. Participating in the current group exhibition (curated by Mehreen Murtaza and Umer Butt) at Greynoise Gallery, Lahore.
In the show entitled "Patrons of Oh! My God i can buy Art!" opens 25th October 2009.

Our work is entitled:
"People's Art Historical Garden Centre"
A project of P.A.H.P.
(People's Art and Historical Project)

David Chalmers Alesworth and Adnan Madani

Variations: 1/12
Recycled paper and live seeds.
October 2009


PAHP: Tomorrow's History, Today.


"The P.A.H.G.C. aims to create a new and green space for supra-critical reappraisal of the use-value of art history (as written from the point of view of colonial and post-colonial
govern-mentality), by converting the plastic objects of art history into objects of everyday fetish use for the subjects of history. The dissemination of alter-knowledge and the insemination of alter-culture are the short, medium and long term goals of this project, which conforms closely to the will of the people while correspondingly attempting to shape the contours of that will and its future forms."


David Alesworth
Adnan Madani
Lahore
Oct. 2009


Video documentation and context for "P.A.H.G.C.P"


Mahmood with a collection of raw material.
Oxford University Press's "Image and Identity" by Akbar Naquvi.
In this book he describes my practice in the mid 1990's as being more orientated towards
horticulture than art making.


Iqbal Geoffrey to whom this work is in part homage.


Mahmood at work with editioned works behind him.


In the gallery prior to the opening.


The rosta of participating artists in this group show.




Gallery goers and Mahmood at work producing useful paper bags from this troubled text.
Gallery visitors were encourgaded to take away free art-historical bags containing live vegetable seeds.


The work place, finished bags to the right.


The seeds in the foreground are added to each bag.
They are egg plant, melons, cabbage and chillies.


The twelve editioned works, each bag contains some live seeds,
the local seed packets are inserted into each art-historical bag.
Each bag/seed packet combination is mounted on a facsimile herbarium sheet
and framed with acid free archival materials.




This is the hebarium mount for each of the editioned works.



Readings readings readings....(Context only)





Will I will never read fast enough?
How will I ever retain all I need to?

"The Home Front" travelling horticultural experiments

All this has to become work too.......


Weddelia and Washingtonia in the front garden, October 2009.


Luca, from our room to the Olive orchard.


The Olive grove at alta Luca, Tuscan hills.



Unripe Ginko Biloba Seeds from near Cuvrystrasse, Berlin.
Prior to planting. None have sprouted in three months.


The vegetable garden and wormery on my return from Europe.
Almost everything is dead.


How the Tuscan Olive cuttings were at the begining, August 2009.
-three months later only one is still green.






Thuja orinetalis From near Camp Darby, Tuscany.


More unripe Ginko nuts


The summer's seed gleanings


Stop Camp Darby.
Outside Pisa Botanical Garden.
Camp Darby is a 2500 acre US munitions dump in the Tuscan countryside between Luca and Pisa.



Congolese Avocado's



Cat and slug proofing the Ruccola seedlings, moth balls and slug-bait.


Tuscan Olive cuttings


Tuscan olive cuttings


Pots at Lahore nursery.

Baltistan (-towards some new work)

Working for Agha Khan Cultural Services on the Baltit forts,
as the horticultural consultant.
First visit October 2009


Mushtaq's solar dryer house in Saling, he's to the left of his new house.
Mushtaq was a cook in Saudi Arabia for a number of years.
He's now a keen gardener and has a fish farm, garden and restaurant which is
very much of his own taste. He's drying Sea-Buckthorn berries and Apricots here, making a medicinal jam in the kitchen downstairs. The labels carry his email address.


Mushtaq's private museum of local treasures.
Everything is directly labeled, on it's surface.


Between Khaplu and Saling, impossible scale.


Paeony in the gardens at Khaplu fort.
This raises interesting issues about what constitutes an authentic garden here.







The mali's and their tools.


Khaplu fort.



The garden at Khaplu


The mali's herbarium.
All the wild flowers appear the same in this state.


Gardens at Khaplu fort. Mostly raised from imported seeds.
The structure of lack of it is what interests me.


Khaplu fort


Ceiling at Khaplu fort


Khaplu fort


Khaplu fort


Nuts and fruits at Khaplu


The Project




Landing at Shigar fort


the view from Shigar fort, dawn.

So how does this become work?

Obviously diaristically, but also I am intending to undetake interviews with the local inhabitants concerning their ideas about the "garden". There are also some interesting rumours of an english governess and the Mir's son. This may have resulted in a disinheritance, the couple ultimately lived in the gardens of Khaplu fort. I suspect thats how a number of British plants arrived there, and are still persisting hundreds of years later.