News

Raqs Media Collective – "It is possible because it is possible" at MUAC, Mexico City

Raqs Media Collective
It is possible because it is possible
University Museum of Contemporary Art (MUAC), Mexico City
7 March – 28 June, 2015

It is possible because it is possible to gather a set of spare Raqs Media Collective, artistic group created in 1992 and based in New Delhi. Raqs is a laboratory of thought that proposes to aesthetics as a starting point for social and political reflection. The name “Raqs” refers both to the word used in Persian, Arabic and Urdu to define a state of meditation, as the acronym for “Rarely Asked Questions” [rarely asked-questions], a nod to the FAQS “Frequently Asked Questions “[frequently asked questions] found in many pages web .
It is possible because it is possible is a claim against a defeatist determinism. Faced with the uncertainty of that I would prefer not to [do so rather] the character created by Melville, in his Bartleby, the Scrivener, “It is possible because it is possible” it is imperative on the possibility of passing from potency to act, and holding open against possible; for collective involves what can happen, because as stated, is already happening.
In this sense, the exhibition examines the work of Raqs as one of the possibilities of practice, criticism and invention as well as a refutation of certain determinism that seems we are doomed. This “possibility” also becomes an antidote against the apparent obligation to accept impositions, impressed or not. Each work, allegory, reflection, image and artifact that the group has created a momentum that is needed today: critical prevent confusion with the complaint and impotence, defy logic perceived and operates in the world as if it were predestined closed and worn, just because we live in a seemingly triumphant system.
One focus of the exhibition is the question of time, the organization of the sequence of events and the systematic regularization between work, rest and leisure in today’s society. Time is for capitalism a fundamental notion, as it is possibly the only convertible currency and safe value. A value that is directly linked to our mortal condition, and is therefore a finite commodity. Time is the work of Raqs the battlefield of the struggle that occurs in the body of each worker, dividing their working time and leisure, ingesting stimulants like coffee or tea to resist or adapt to the productive machine.
Another issue underlying the project is the thought of postcolonialism in the belief that all humans belong to the same community, we run the risk of being trapped by global capitalism that redefines the differences in a flat market exclusively. How to be as cosmopolitan without being colonized? This would be thinking about the way in which to overcome the hierarchies and dichotomies to generate modes of thought that accept the complexity of a different future to that power has been determined.
RAQS MEDIA COLLECTIVE
Raqs Media Collective is a group settled in New Delhi, India. It was created in 1992 by Jeebesh Bagchi (1966), Monica Narula (1969) and Shuddhabrata Sengupta (1968).
Raqs is a laboratory of thought that proposes to aesthetics as a starting point for social and political reflection. The origin of its name refers both to the word used in Persian, Arabic and Urdu defining a state of meditation, as the acronym RAQS “Rarely Asked Questions” [rarely asked-questions]. The group focused its initial interest in documentary film making films as In The Eye of The Fish (1997), Present Imperfect, Future Tense (1999) Growing Up (1995) . Playing multiple roles, class members act as artists, curators and as they are defined: philosophical agents provocateurs. Currently performs installations and performances, as well as publishing projects, curatorial and educational programs from different disciplines such as sociology, geography, mathematics, industrial design and urban planning. Always playing with a vague poetic, Raqs Media Collective analyzes the past, consider the present and imagine the future.