In the central hall of Dr Bhau Daji Lad (BDL) Museum in Mumbai, is a giant panel featuring Thomas Browne, an English polymath from the 17th century, and naturalist Charles Darwin (a nod to Sarnath Banerjee’s former works and BDL’s previous life as a museum of natural history). Upstairs, in a room with chiaroscuro lighting, is a cabinet filled with an assortment of strange, even macabre, objects — from a man’s head and an ancient sword to a book on Arabic surgeries. Interspersed are sound installations, narrating fictional, often horrifying, tales. The Berlin-based artist and graphic novelist’s first museum solo, Spectral Times , combines text, illustration and a ‘radio’ component to create an exhbition that is simultaneously elaborate and eerie.
Spectral Times: Sarnath Banerjee’s dialogue with the dead
Combining illustrations and radio recordings, Sarnath Banerjee’s new exhibit is a fictional account of a Mumbai we don’t see
Phalguni Desai, The Hindu, March 1, 2019
