Third Text

Nilofar Akmut performed Amnesia at the Third Text symposium ‘To Draw the Line: Partitions, Dissonance, Art – A Case for South Asia’ at the Bluecoat Gallery, Liverpool, 15 November 2017

AMNESIA

Silence upon silence
Cacophony of wails
Brutal is the pain of separation
Etched on my mind’s eye
Incidents of their time
Demons shouting horror, envy and cruelty
Memories shift interred
Screaming mercy where none can be found
A banner at my feet
Silence upon silence

The ‘To Draw the Line: Partitions, Dissonance, Art – A Case for South Asia’ symposium was organised by Alice Correia and Natasha Eaton, on behalf of Third Text

Other participants were: Pippa Virdee @70: dreams and legacies of a divided land  /  Naiza Khan Set in a Moment, Yet still Moving – Performance  /  Karin Zitzewitz Infrastructure as Form: Cross-Border Networks and the Materialities of ‘South Asia’ in Contemporary Art  /  Raminder Kaur Partition, Memory and Migration Overseas  /  Raisa Kabir Weaving communities of resistance: Crossing thresholds, crafting identity, and lines of conflict in Bangladesh  /  Alice Correia Imagining India/Remembering Britain: Contemporary Art from the South Asian Diaspora  /  Mohini Chandra Paradise Lost: Kikau Street and Forty Ships (2016/2017)  /  Zehra Jumabhoy The Lines We Control (Seriously, a Spoof)

Nilofar Akmut studied at the National College of Art, Lahore, Pakistan (1975–1979), at the Byam Shaw School of Art (1982–1986) and the Slade School of Fine Art (1986–1988) in London, and studied documentary film-making at Royal Holloway, University of London (2013–2014). Recent exhibitions and events include ‘My mother gave birth to a nation and never recovered’, Toki Art Space, Tokyo (2018); ‘Virginal vaginas’, Apexart, New York; ‘Once upon a time I was exotic, now I am a terrorist’ on the streets of London; ‘Drawings for Syria’, Rabley Drawing Centre, Marlborough, UK (2017); ‘Point of View’, Nagoya, Japan (2015). Amnesia has been performed on the London streets, at the Institute of Advanced Studies, University College London (2018), and the Dhaka Art Summit (2014). Earlier street performances include They came home to roost (Lahore, 2003) and Nuclear, Nuclear (Karachi, 2000).