In a tour de force that transcends the label “solo exhibition,” Sudarshan Shetty turns wooden objects into a tactile tale of temporality and ontology that tells of both inanimate matter and its living counterparts. In a space sparsely installed with classical materials such as porcelain, earthenware, and wood, the melancholic tune of a sarangi lilts forth from a video depicting three sequential settings—liminal zones comprising aisles, arches, and atria. Forming triptychs of sorts, each in turn is reproduced thrice, side by side, but with different foregrounds: a woman playing the sarangi, a teacup atop a table, and, finally, the environment left emptied, with neither musician nor cup. The cup falls at regular time intervals as the music is interrupted by the sound of the shattering ceramic. The viewer, in the act of listening, becomes complicit in this atmosphere of longing and loss that lodges itself into the objects in the room: a lone branch, a coat, and a cup hanging in a dimly lit corner, and two regal busts that stand proudly on pedestals, each with a glass of water in place of its head. There is a surreal sense that things have been abandoned, that time itself has been left behind.

None of the installations are titled, so the name of the exhibit, “Every Broken Moment Piece by Piece,” holds together all the works, just as—in the individual pieces—fragments of porcelain cups are molded together with wood. Most mesmerizing is another kind of triptych: parts of a reclaimed chair that protrude from three wooden panels. The furniture becomes a folly, removed of function, and an image, instead, of the presence of absence. Lines such as “Imagine he was losing a lifetime of fortune to a grand deluge” are etched into the wooden panels, resounding in sentimental silence. The abundance of wood, constructed and contoured, evokes a subliminal sense that even objects, overgrown and bulbous, are renewing themselves, a reminder that after everything has fallen—teacups tipped and spun about on their own axis, telling circular time—remnants of us persist.

— Himali Singh Soin