Artist Rohini Devasher recounts a unique residency that she has just finished - one that made her a mariner in the South Pacific
High Trust anchored at Apia, Samoa. Pic/Rohini Devasher
Artis Rohini Devasher calls it serendipity. A couple of years ago, the New Delhi-based artist was chosen for The Owner's Cabin. An artist residency, the program invites artists to travel on a merchant ship. For the 39-year-old artist, the invitation to journey the high seas came as the perfect opportunity to further her interests in science and the natural world. Devasher waited, deferring the prospect till this year. On May 26, she embarked on High Trust, an oil tanker that travelled across the South Pacific, touching three countries on its way.
"While a few people choose these days to travel by cargo ship, it's still pretty uncommon, and, an oil tanker is impossible!" says Devasher. High Trust left Suva, the capital city of the island nation of Fiji, stopping at two ports in Samoa and American Samoa, and ending at Singapore on June 20. As an invitee, Devasher had the chance to choose her journey — the time, the ship, the route — and The Owner's Cabin would let her know what's available.
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Devasher with High Trust's crew. Pic/Visakhan Syamalan
What Devasher did not have control over was the journey itself. "Once I signed up for the residency, things started rolling quickly. With an Indian passport, you need to figure visas for every port. That was a concern," she recalls. However, it was "perfect skies and perfect seas" for the amateur mariner. Though mid-year marks winter in the Southern Hemisphere, her voyage was upward, towards the equator, so the weather was favourable, she adds.
Unusual retreats
As the fourth artist-in-residence, Devasher is the first Indian to be invited by The Owner's Cabin. She was also the first artist to opt for an oil tanker, rather than a cargo vessel. The Owners' Cabin is certainly not her first brush with the extremities and the beauties of the natural world. As one of India's well-regarded contemporary artists, trained in painting and printmaking, Devasher has travelled to many offbeat locales.
Devasher incorporated latitude templates into cyanotypes. Pic/Project 88
As a participating artist in the 5th Fukuoka Asian Art Triennale, in 2014, she visited Mount Aso, Japan's largest active volcano. Earlier, as a Sarai Associate Fellow in New Delhi, she interviewed astronomers and visited several observatories, including the Indian Astronomical Observatory in Hanle, near Leh. A part of this work resulted in Deep Time, shown at Project 88, Colaba in 2013.
For artists, a residency is a fully- funded chance to get away from a familiar working environment, in order to be more reflective of one's practice. During the course of the residency, they may or may not choose to create a new works, but what's definitive is the chance to immerse oneself in new surroundings, and have an reinvigorated thought process. Devasher describes this residency as "a retreat", one suitable for writers, too.
Ship as studio
When High Trust docked at ports, Devasher, the only woman on-board, made the best of her onshore time. She explored neighbourhoods, such as the Colo-i-Suva Forest Park in Fiji, and the capital of American Samoa, Pago Pago. However, the best part of the residency was the ship itself, as is evident from her accounts and her enthusiasm. The chance to see endless horizons, the ocean from edge to edge, is memorable, says the artist. "The residency was a great chance for astrophotography, cloud-gazing, categorising shades of blue. Besides, you have very limited access to the Internet. The ship then is like a mini island; and it's just you and your work," she says.
Onboard, conditions were perfect to catch the Milky Way, says Devasher
With large sea vessels, there is protocol that they turn down their lights with nightfall, so that smaller fishing vessels are easily spotted. "This meant that you have to operate in complete darkness, allowing for perfect conditions to capture the Milky Way," says Devasher, who travelled with an ammo of cameras, lenses and art material. Her previous trips to observatories didn't compare to this. "The clouds tend to follow me everywhere. For a change, I got a clear sky," she laughs, adding that she has been an amateur astronomer since 1997.
The crew, she observes, is one big family, which was initially puzzled by her activities, such as shots of the sea every five minutes. But their curiosity soon turned into support, as they helped her understand the nuances of navigation. "They have old star-based navigation maps, which they could resort to if technology ever fails," says Devasher, whose 2016 solo of video works and prints at the Dr. Bhau Daji Lad Museum explored the museum's astronomical and scientific tools.
Devasher also made the ship her workshop, employing its tools and learning welding techniques. "I wanted to work with the material of the ship's body," she continues, "so, I procured copper plates. Their burnished golden bronze reminded me of the sunrises and sunsets I had been recording every day." The copper plates and the old navigation maps, which have been transformed into cyanotypes, are some of the works to emerge from the residency. Over the coming months, Devasher will be making more. While Devasher thinks that she got matched with the perfect residency, she also feels that she is at a point in life where she has to pick her projects carefully. "The older you get, the more energy and time it takes to do things. So I try and limit myself, and focus."
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