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Through the Bamboo Wall by Saif Osmani
Photographs, Paintings and Testimonies
25th November – 16th December 2011
Showing at Winterbourne House, Coach House Gallery
By documenting the material exchanges that take place in everyday transitory spaces, we connect with those actions which have been taken place over centuries. The treatment of bamboo has paralleled the changes in human development; it has been carved, woven, joined, has shifting in form, increasing in mass and in recent times deceased in our collective psyche.
Through constant re-abbreviation bamboo has gained meaning, produced cultural symbolism and also retained its position as a silent signifier to the past whilst giving rise to a possibility of a future.
London- based visual artist and spatial designer, Saif Osmani presents his research on Taiwan’s regional response to bamboo whilst connecting the gallery space with the site-specific of Winterbourne House & Garden.
The artist recently returned from a residency in Taiwan (as part of Bamboo Curtain Studio’s Emerging Artist’s Programme), where he interviewed practitioners and recorded the places where he found bamboo within Taipei City, Chaiyi and Nantou.
In his search for lost crafts, untold narratives and missing linkages he began to formulate a language of Taiwan’s own material condition and how the inhabitants connect with their own urban sphere.
This exhibition includes over 100 photographs of markets scenes, religious rituals, street life, the region’s architecture and natural landscapes.
Inspired by Taiwanese native artistic forms, Saif has produced paintings from personal stories from his grandparents time in Bangladesh.
Oral testimonies are also presented alongside the photographs for cross-cultural reference and to contextualise the pictures.
Earlier this year Saif invited artists, architects, designers, photographers and oral historians to explore the cultural associations of bamboo from around the world. This came to form ‘Baasher Ghor’ (‘Bamboo House’ in Bengali), an information exchange and a platform for practitioners who primarily work with the material.
One of the artists he connected with, Birmingham-based artist Maria Zerguine, tells the story of growing up living in a bamboo house in the Phillippines with her grandmother which is a personal heart-warming and powerful untold story.
‘Through the Bamboo Wall’ is showing from 25th November- 16th December 2011 at The Coach House Gallery, Winterbourne House & Garden, University of Birmingham, 58 Edgbaston Park Road, Birmingham, B15 2RT
Opening times: Daily 10am – 4pm
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111 Scenes
30/07/11 – 04/08/11 (opening 30/7 at 15:00)
Showing at: Bamboo Curtain Studio, No.39, Lane 88, Sec. 2, Zhongzheng E. Rd., Danshui Dist., New Taipei City 251, Taiwan (R.O.C.)
Tel: +886 2 8809 3809, +886 2 28081465 E-mail: studio[at]bambooculture.com
111 Scenes
By documenting the material exchanges that take place in transitory spaces, in the exchanges and occurrences of daily life, we connect with those which have been taken place over centuries. Bamboo has materially adapted in parallel to human history, by being carved, woven, joined, shifting in form, increasing in mass, deceasing in our collective psyches; through re-abbreviation, gaining meaning and producing symbolism. Throughout this time is has retained its position as a silent signifier to the past and gives rise to a possibility of a future.
The concept of the ‘Baasher Ghor’ or ‘Bamboo House’ seeks to look beyond the means of a self-contained place with a fixed setting, or one singular view, it is instead an abode of many openings and entrances, of multiple frontages and enclosures. The house is still defined by its material essence with inexhaustible connections and still retains the ability to adapt alongside our changing human senses whilst still remaining at core, a house made of bamboo.
‘Baasher Ghor’ presents 35 projects from architects, designers, sculptors, photographers, oral historians and poets from four continents. Each respondent has looked at the material within a narrative in space, connecting it to a real or imaginary place or country of origin.
111個場景
在稍縱即逝的空間裡，日常交易與生活事件記錄著物質的交換，我們與這些行為相連結已經好幾個世紀。竹子質材的使用方式，與人類發展的歷史平行產生，從雕刻、編織、結合、外觀上的更換、大眾化使用，甚至在我們的集體心理中消失。透過重新縮寫，獲得意義和產生象徵意義，同時還保持著某種無聲的符號，有著通往過去和未來的可能性。
〝竹屋計畫〞所找尋的概念遠超出一個獨立〝房子〞本身的設置，或者是一個單一觀點，相反的，這個計畫是找尋一個居所可能具有的開放空間、入口，建築物的立面以及圍欄，這個〝竹屋〞顧名思義仍是以竹子為核心質材，並且保有竹子本身無限延伸的連結與適應人類演變的特質。
〝竹屋計畫〞展現來自四大洲，35位建築師、設計師、雕塑家、攝影師、口述歷史學者與詩人，回應了對於竹子的看法，如同對空間的描述，並與真實或者想像的空間/ 國家/區域相連接。
Yu-Chih Hsiao and students from Shih Chien University prepare to relocate ‘The Big Cradle on the Road’
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All Baasher Ghor projects will be showing in the Danshui District of Taipei from July – August 2011.
As part of an international curatorial residency, field research is being carried out looking into the regional response to bamboo in the urban districts of the city and aboriginal village settings. The programme is expected to accumulate in an exhibition and talk in the first week of August.
If you would like to know more, please email us.
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Brick Lane Circle‘s upcoming programme of events will feature all 25 projects accepted onto Baasher Ghor.
The event is being held on Wednesday 27th April 2011 at the Brady Centre, Hanbury Street, Whitechapel, London E1, from 7-9pm.
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Baasher Ghor will be showing as part of Chelsea, Camberwell, Wimbledon design lecture series.
Date: Monday 28th March 2011
Time: 6pm
Place: Chelsea College of Art & Design, Main Lecture Hall (2nd floor), 16 John Islip Street, London SW1P 4JU (opposite Tate Britain). Nearest station is Pimlico (Victoria Line).
‘Material of Resistance – contesting the cultural and aesthetic ownership of bamboo’
Chaired by Dr Yuko Kikuchi
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This is a new lecture series on Monday evenings starting from January. The series is created as part of the design courses at CCW primarily for graduate students who are studying Design and Design History across CCW. Lectures will address critical issues and research methodologies that are currently being debated in the field of Design. Speakers will be invited widely from design historians, theorists and practitioners.
Open lecture – All welcome
Baasher Ghor// Benjamin Garcia, Costa Rica
Bamboo spans a third of the globe, coming into the architectural limelight every 7 or so years. Recent bamboo structures include ROEWU Architecture’s house at i-lan, Taiwan (2008), Simon Velez’s pavilion, the Nomadic Museum in Mexico City (2009) and Doug and Mike Starn’s growing installation ‘Big Bambu’ on top of New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art (ended October 2010). These newer constructions appear to enquire and often jar against the material’s innate cultural attachment, with bamboo increasingly being placed alongside other wood samples, a mere decoration on the building’s envelope; moving further away from centuries of art, craft and architectural discourse existing in the southern hemisphere.
This lecture will begin with the parallel modernist design movements which took place in Asia, Europe and America, in particular the cultural reforms inside Japan around the time of World War II, where in a bid to constitute its own kind of Orientalism, bamboo became a tool in Japan’s cultural imperialism towards governing the wider East Asian identity. Around the same time South Asian countries entered a time of partition and displacement with decades of politically problematic regimes, still prevalent today in current day Pakistan and Bangladesh. With an increase in activity from non-government organisations, foreign agendas and agencies began influencing aspects of national ideology, with the vernacular shifting further towards bamboo being viewed as the ‘native’ or ‘poor’ people’s material.
The changing spatial configuration of the village compound in Bangladesh will be investigated as well as the histories of a bamboo ‘psyche’, propagated by Titu Mir (1782-1831), the rebel peasant leader who built the notorious Bamboo Fort against the zamindars and colonialists, alongside more recent examples of Mohammed Yunus’s Grameen Bank Foundation, where in an attempt to build homes for the ‘ultra poor’, the scheme has brought bamboo closer to realising its short comings and superiority over its perceived counterpart, concrete.
Saif will also be speaking about an international art and design platform called Baasher Ghor or Bamboo House (in Bengali), aiming to draw stronger parallels along cross-cultural lines and arts disciplines, opening debate and discussion on current discourse concerning the use of Bamboo. With a clear footing in the UK, the project consists of a month-long exhibition, publication, a residency, international workshops and talks bringing contemporary issues of sustainability, ethical practice, ethnicity, nationhood, theory of neo-colonialism, neo-traditionalism and ‘native’ disciplines to the forefront, in order to offer solutions and facilitate problem-solving through a collaborative process of shared understanding and active involvement on the field. Baasher Ghor has received over 25 respondents from across 4 continents, ranging from artists, sound artists, designers, architects, poets and oral historians.
Saif Osmani // Spatial Designer/ Visual artist/ Architecture Curator
Saif has over 5 years experience working on a variety of architectural, landscape and urban design schemes in and around London from social housing, theatres to community spaces. He is visiting tutor at Canterbury University for the Creative Arts and a former Chelsea alumni.
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At present we are in talks with a leading London-based art and architecture gallery, working towards a month-long exhibition for 2011/ 12.
The programme will include international residencies, talks and workshops and a publication containing all participants’ projects. This is dependent on securing funds.
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Baasher Ghor has been accepted on an international residency with the Bamboo Curtain Studio (Bamboo Culture) in Taipei, Taiwan.
All participants’ projects will be shown in the gallery space, with accompanying field research, workshops and talks with schools, universities and cultural institutions in and around Taipei.
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This site is a means of information exchange and will be updated regularly as the project unfolds.
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Baasher Ghor was officially launched in September/ October 2010 at Oxford House (The Gallery Space, Derbyshire Street, Bethnal Green London E2 6HG):
