Audio Description
Nitin Parmar
Nitin Parmar is a multidisciplinary designer and artist and has an MA in Costume Design for Performance (University of the Arts London).
His work creates environments fusing imagery, set design, music, performance and costume to evoke sensory experiences beyond the confines of the conventional, and experimenting with merging physical costumes and stage sets with projected imagery.
His work encapsulates installations and costumes for film and stage.
The work on display centres around the context of migration, cultural identity and colonialism, reinterpreting lost cultural stories and fictional tales.
Other themes include exploring the materiality of the black, to create a sense of the real and unreal, merging the physical and the digital.
Previous works include designing sets for theatre, and costumes on large studios (Warner Bros) and independent films.
Nitin Parmar has shown his digital short film work by invitation at various events including the Aesthetica Short Film Festival (ASFF) 2022, and also the launch for the newly opened digital space The Outernet – the largest digital exhibition space in Europe.
Prior to pursuing costume and set design, Nitin Parmar had
a successful career within the fashion industry, working as a fashion and product designer as well as art directing and styling brand imagery.
Website
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Kala Pani
(Hindi - taboo); literal translation means black water
‘Kala Pani’ is an ancient Hindu religious concept that represents the taboo of travelling outside of the Indian continent, resulting in the loss of one’s cultural and religious identity.
In the 18th-century, a stratagem was used by European imperialists to lure indentured labourers from India to work in the Caribbean. To persuade fearful travellers, large vats of water, supposedly filled from the Ganges (considered holy), were taken aboard the ships. This falsely reassured the travellers with continuity of reincarnation beyond ‘Kala Pani’.
In my narrative, ‘Kali’ the goddess of death, time and change materialises in reply to the prayers of the travellers, to grant them death, so that reincarnation can deliver them to a new life.
My work also addresses environmental and socio-political issues. The current state of pollution of our seas, contributing to our very own ‘dark waters’ and the ongoing state of migration around the world which presents the same challenges faced in the 18th century.
My film is an observation and investigation into the materiality of black, and how it can affect the perception, and context of a subject and inform the area between the real and unreal.
Selected Works
Scroll through art works. Click to enlarge
Kala Pani
(Hindi - taboo); literal translation means black water
‘Kala Pani’ is an ancient Hindu religious concept that represents the taboo of travelling outside of the Indian continent, resulting in the loss of one’s cultural and religious identity.
In the 18th-century, a stratagem was used by European imperialists to lure indentured labourers from India to work in the Caribbean. To persuade fearful travellers, large vats of water, supposedly filled from the Ganges (considered holy), were taken aboard the ships. This falsely reassured the travellers with continuity of reincarnation beyond ‘Kala Pani’.
In my narrative, ‘Kali’ the goddess of death, time and change materialises in reply to the prayers of the travellers, to grant them death, so that reincarnation can deliver them to a new life.
My work also addresses environmental and socio-political issues. The current state of pollution of our seas, contributing to our very own ‘dark waters’ and the ongoing state of migration around the world which presents the same challenges faced in the 18th century.
My film is an observation and investigation into the materiality of black, and how it can affect the perception, and context of a subject and inform the area between the real and unreal.
‘Alice in Wonderland – reimagined’
‘Alice in Wonderland - reimagined’ is set in colonial India, 1947 during ‘Partition’.
Alice is a 14-year-old girl who resides in the old state of Punjab, now a part of Pakistan. She will be forced to migrate across the newly formed India-Pakistan border to new Punjab (now in India). This will be perilous, Partition was the largest mass migration in history, displacing over 18 million people and resulting in up to 2 million lives lost.
Her home is a large vacated mansion where her parents work for the British Raj. She has grown up alone in the mansion and adopted it as her playground.
Her surroundings are a vast and empty room, except for furniture and chandeliers that are covered in dust sheets.
Alice, aware of the looming chaos, finds solace in her imagination, she becomes a dancing chandelier, escaping the impending devastation of Partition outside.
To further escape, she loses herself in her imagination, into a world of tales and stories from her upbringing; festivals such as Holi and Diwali, with multi-headed, multi-limbed Indian gods, goddesses and demons, such the Nataraja, the goddess of dance, or the demon Ravenna who manifests as the White Rabbit and the Mad Hatter.
Anansi
(ə-NAHN-see); literal translation means spider
Anansi, a prominent figure in West African, Caribbean and African- American folklore, is typically portrayed as a spider. Originating in Ghana, these spider tales were carried to the Caribbean through the transatlantic slave trade. Anansi symbolises the resilience of migrating individuals who overcome adversity and establish new lives wherever they find themselves.
In the lives of enslaved people, Anansi served various roles. He inspired strategies of resistance, provided a link to their African heritage, and offered a means to assert their identity within
the confines of captivity. These stories provided hope, cultural preservation, and a foundation for cultural rebellion, ultimately leading to spiritual freedom. Anansi was even revered as god-like, serving as a mediator between humans and the sky deity, Nyame. Through Anansi’s persuasion, Nyame brought essential elements like rain and night to the people and the earth.
My film portrays the ascension of Anansi, then bestowing the darkest nights and heaviest rains, and his eventual return to the earth.
The film continues my study into the materiality of black, and how the suggestion and use of minimal light greatly enhances its power.
This short film revisits the context that lies between the real and unreal.
