Arijit Bhattacharyya
Born in Bally, West Bengal, Arijit Bhattacharyya‘s practice traverses a heterogeneous landscape, encompassing installation, textiles, drawing, painting, film, publication, performance, and culinary arts. It functions beyond mere aesthetic execution to probe complex historical narratives, ecological entanglements, and the legacies of power. Central to this inquiry is an enduring challenge to anthropocentric paradigms, exploring an anthropo-decentralized existence that blurs trans-species boundaries. Through speculative futures, his work disrupts entrenched hierarchies and reimagines systems marked by historical and ongoing oppression, proposing symbiotic, resistant alternatives.
Arijit intermittently engages in the deliberate derision of established power dynamics, casting aspersions on and undermining the inviolability of the existing status quo. His practice thrives on collective engagement, cultivating spaces where divergent voices converge for reflection. Through collaborations across various contexts, he aims to ignite dialogues that are both intimate and ideological, facilitating a transdisciplinary inquest into the hegemonic-capitalist imprints on the global condition. Through his work, he seeks to provoke an expansive reimagining of existence, unearthing nuanced forms of resilience within the interstices of power and coexistences.
Arijit is an alumnus of the Bauhaus Universität Weimar and the Maharaja Sayaji Rao University of Baroda.
The Night of Long Silence, 2024
The Night of Long Silence is an ongoing, interdisciplinary research project that interweaves personal witnessing, archival materials, and landscape (geographical, social, political, economic and digital) to critically interrogate the systemic violence inflicted upon minority communities in post-reunification Germany. Traversing historical markers such as the 1992 Rostock-Lichtenhagen riots and the National Socialist Underground’s killing spree, as well as contemporary forms of righting rhetoric—including the viral appropriation of ‘L’amour toujours’ into a xenophobic anthem—this project probes the socio-political trajectory that has led to a resurgent right-wing populism. Drawing on André Lepecki’s conceptual distinction between the passive spectator and the active, accountable witness, I reposition the audience not merely as observers, but as co-researchers and narrators of these violent histories, thus reactivating witnessing as an ethical, political imperative. As an immigrant and educator embedded within German academia, I address the erosion of human dignity within both far-right and conservative discourses that systematically dehumanize society’s most vulnerable.
The title ‘The Night of Long Silence’ comes from the repeated attempts made by Vili Viorel Păun, to contact the emergency services to inform them about the shootings. Păun called five times with two unsuccessful attempts. During the three successful attempts, he was only met with silence on the other end of the line as the dispatcher receiving the call left to respond to the shootings on Heumarkt. Moments later Păun was shot and killed by the shooter. The project seeks to transform witnessing into a political act of collective memory and responsibility.
Arijit Bhattacharyya