Large screen-prints by gallery curator of 9 King Street, Danny Flynn capture the complexities of Indian indentured migrants’ experiences and identities who were shipped from India to Mauritius between 1834 and 1910 to work on sugar plantations. The original photographs which were found in the Mauritian archives were sourced by the historian Dr Marina Carter and which have been reimagined and transformed into contemporary works of art are being shown alongside a series of sugar bowls by ceramicist Angela Strange. Each piece carries a transfer pattern that has been torn and remains incomplete, echoing lives shaped by displacement and fracture, and the difficulty of holding identity across generations.
‘The portraits with their faces fixed towards the camera seem to be confronting the viewer in a head-on challenge, with a look that could even be viewed as accusatory. In contrast, those portraits faced off to one side enforce a more voyeuristic engagement. All are unblinking as they concentrate, some are watery as if they have the ocean in their eyes, all partaking in the same process, but each in varying states of being – abandonment can be seen, and uncertainty in some of the young. There are visibly sad and broken men. There is weariness and even madness in some, yet also the dignified defiance of the women, along with the more grandiose adorned with beads and jewellery. All are looking off into the distance, from a distance.’ Extracted from: ‘Pulled through Time: Art and the Indian Labour Migrant.’ by Marina Carter & Danny Flynn.
I opened the gallery in January this year and upon hearing The Rum Story had provided a focus on enslaved people with sugar being a main character (or culprit) connecting the related narratives – I was prompted to launch a collaboration with a local artist and show my screen-print series as indentureship is often referred to as ‘a new system of enslaved people’.
The show will run from 2nd July to 25th July with open viewings to meet the artists with complimentary red wine and a choice of craft beers from West Wall Brewery in Carlisle on Saturday 11th July and Saturday 25th July from 4pm to 6pm.
The gallery is open Thursday, Friday, Saturday from midday to 6pm.
