Britto Arts Trust

 Old Dhaka through New Eyes

 Not that this is for the first time I have been to Old Dhaka.But still, this time my eyes could go farther and deeper, so as to make me face an unwarranted shock!

This time I have come across some things that are not only new to me, but also radically different

from the way I had been looking at it so far!

Yes, the prides of THOSE GOOD DAYS are still there, though in somewhat evolved forms and extents, at least worth a golden reminiscence! Almost every pillar and gate still tells you some story. BUT, into a hidden trap of that residue, of that grand great era, How many faces amidst, at all, are comfortable or happy with this and that up to these days? Neither the progress dynamics of the nation nor what we call ‘globalization’, has reached this wretched corner. Nothing here is breathing any fresh or free– neither the confined commerce nor the suffocating crowd.


In this very reconstruction or deconstruction, I have just tried to reflect my wonders, shocks and discomforts along my new voyage onto here, and mostly cum basically, the things and feelings I was not that ready or glad to find.

Nazmul Ahsan

Dhaka: A City of Glory

I have focused on archival imagery of Old Dhaka for 1mile².

Founded in the 4th century, Dhaka first received principal status in 1610, when the Mughals transferred the capital from Rajmahal to Dhaka, and renamed it Jahangirnagar.  Then the city passed to the control of the British East India Company in 1765. Following the partition of Bengal in 1905 and again in 1946, Dhaka became the capital of East Bengal and it was ruled by Pakistan. In 1971 Bangladesh established as an independent country and Dhaka remained its capital.

In this project, my search was to find how Dhaka has diversified historically, anthropologically, geographically or culturally. I have highlighted historical landmarks; buildings & monuments and their changing situation. Noting the dates in which the images were taken, the viewer can see how their uses have changed. This pictorial website also serves as a document of our shifting lifestyles and professions.

Staging Dhaka's Awakening


Staging Dhaka's Awakening is a sound installation that stages a kind of prayer to preserve the soul of the city, its heritage and the diversity of its cultures. I mixed the city's daily soundscape, namely an azaan recorded in Old Dhaka before sunrise on a rooftop surrounded by seven mosques, with a musical performance by Murung mouth-organs players, to evoke the presence of indigenous cultures in an urban environment. The setting of the dressing room in the old theatre named Laal Kuthi – a deserted heritage building – proved a proper place to “stage” this awakening ritual, not only because this room is actually called a “green room”, but also because I wanted to recreate for the viewer the particular atmosphere before a show, when the performer tries both to find quietness inside himself and to relate to his masters or to the divinities that will be embodied on stage, an attitude I wished people had before performing any change in the city's setting; an attitude of respect.

Kamruzzaman Shadhin

 Garbage, I am.

 I am garbage like the other garbage in Dhaka.

I admit the blame but the policy makers who pushed me to come to Dhaka should take the responsibility.

People speak of boatmen.

I heard of a boatman who rowed down from Sadharghat to Zinzira his whole life. Every day he takes the new migrants to Dhaka across the other side of the bank, to their new life. But he himself never saw Dhaka city.

However, in his way he also made Dhaka garbage.

This boatman is my subject. In my daily life I buy water for home. I use huge plastic bottles of water. I discard these plastic bottles into Dhaka every day. These bottles are going into the Buriganga because of me.People say the Buriganga is a dead river. But who will take the responsibility – only a handful of others and me.

Mohammed Wahiduzzaman

 Change

Change is a continuous process.

A city will change naturally through time. Some changes make deeper impressions in our heart. Materialistic civilizations in the name of modernization touches one’s love, tradition and environment pushing them into destruction. Subsequently our heart tries to re-discover the city sifting the pages of memory from the change’s impression.

 Impression has its influence on every aged person but the impression of Dhaka city in the young hearts of 7th and 8th grade students of Dhaka Muslim Govt. High school is focused in this artwork. Audience is a major part of this work because they can express their reactions by helping to change the city. 

My unfinished artwork is itself an ongoing process. The impact of memory in our hearts is a desirable experience through the process of change.

Maynul Islam Paul

Memory of Postcard

Since a decade, the world is moving in a new direction towards the modernity of science and technology.  Post card - the oldest vehicle of contact in our society has almost disappeared. Once, the postcard was one of the most convenient mediums used to get in touch with family and friends.  These days our children have no experience using a post card. Therefore, I tried to introduce this old medium, asking the children to draw or write whatever they desired, and then deliver them to the post office to send their post cards to my own address.  The whole journey was exciting and a new experience for the schoolchildren.

 Original Dhakaiya

 Photography, Kalpana Boarding, Shakhari Bazaar
Once upon a time there was a no city named Dhaka. There existed only an intimate environment between the flowers-birds-rivers-trees- Life. But humans learnt about this peaceful land. They built their houses beside the river Buriganga. Day by day, they destroyed the green beauty and built houses-complexes-monuments-streets-parks. Today just after 400 years- How many trees are still alive in Dhaka city? Birds-animals? Ponds-Rivers-water bodies? Can you tell me? These questions are thought provoking. But somebody survives. In Sadhona of Gandaria, Banagram’s rooftops, Tanti Bazaar, Kaltabazaar, Royshaheb Bazaar, Shayam Bazaar, in some alleys and rooftops of old Dhaka few monkeys are still surviving without any food and shelter.

 These vanishing apes are the oldest inhabitants of today’s Dhaka. Their fate points to look at our own future. Shall we go towards destruction or come together to make a loving world with flowers-birds-rivers-trees- Life?

Barbarous

As you call to a peasant’s reflex action, While he cannot resist slapping a ‘giant’  with the dusty strong hand in return. Does the word truly stand as you say?

Along the river countries. They use the ultra-modern weapons…

Sometimes mental and also biological. Experimentation follows the act of massacre on cats, rats and dragonflies along with the heritage. The technology gets world recognition! You say: Advancement.. Yet, Do these words sound okay for any civilization?

Moulding a society begins with the philosophers, leaders, and influential people’s level of understanding and self-interest. Religion is the force that drives a society with a combination of respect and fear. Irrespective of idol worshipers or any group of believers, sometimes it seems interesting and colourful, and creates a vast breathing space to adapt positivity with new inspiration. It also has a strong, profound and symbolic value to be understood to lead a prosperous life. However, religions sometimes change by the brutal power and blood shedding- that is not acceptable to any society or religion. The fact is: people want peace without war to save culture and cultural heritage in one’s own local place.

Harun-ar Rashid Tutul

City of Boxes on a Horse-Cart

Urmi Basak Shukla, Shahriar Shaon & Raihan Ahmed Rafi 

‘Oh! My Child’


This is an outcome presentation for the 1mile² Dhaka educational workshop. It was a collaborative project between Urmi Basak Shukla, Shahriar Shaon and Raihan Ahmed Rafi, taking place at Oikatan Sangshkriti Charcha Kendra in Old Dhaka. The project was a workshop with the students of the institute to learn how to construct puppets with recycled household waste materials. The puppet and the stage set / props were built by hundreds of energetic students who actively took participation. The concept was to initiate a fun activity for the children to make puppets as a creative, expressive outlet besides their regular education and playtime. The narrative was an attempt to represent the daily life and living of Old Dhaka.

Galipather Golpo: Ek Chilte Rouddur

Galipather Golpo is a story about children who have grown up in Shakhari Bazaar in Old Dhaka.

Although they are living in poor and negligible conditions in congested spaces, however, their dreams are not lost. The canvas of their life-style is huge as they are living with everyone; attending festivals, worshiping Hindu deities, being an active part of their traditional joint families, bearing a high significance in their lives.

These children have blended in with the Old Dhaka culture thus carrying it, upholding 400 years of Shakhari Bazaar’s history within themselves

Halimul Islam Khokon

Shakhari Bazaar is a historic moholla in Old Dhaka. The place is named after shankha, a richly decorated bangle crafted from slices of shankha.

Shakhari Bazaar is the manifestations of the irrational policies, lack of adequate development control rules and distorted legal framework that shares a long history of more than 400 years with Dhaka city itself.

 

The inhabitants of Shakari Bazaar need raw materials from their craft, which is directly imported from Sri Lanka; the material is only available to Mahajons. All types of transactions regarding this importing are controlled by a few numbers of Mahajons. A number of people have moved away to other occupations.

Due to high tariff, import duties & tax on the importing raw materials for shankha, which is imported from Sri Lanka, shankha shilpa is facing an unequal challenge with the Indian shankha smuggled into the country. Some initiatives should be taken to save our one of the oldest traditions.

Jamil Akber Shamim

Visual Interview and Prayer

In the middle of Shyam Bazaar in Old Dhaka, there stands an old temple surrounded by a vegetable bazaar. My main interest was to make drawings in the middle of businessmen and ordinary people carrying on with their day-to-day activities. The work signifies an actual prayer for the prosperity of their businesses.

To illustrate my point, I drew with simple lines to convey different occurrences in the bazaar, into several drawings compiled into one. And I asked the public what all was available in the bazaar, from which I acquired ideas for subjects used in the series of drawings.

Sanjida Shaheed

How do I belong to a space? How do I react to a particular space in a particular time? The happenings in a moment that unfold before my eyes are arbitrary and they don’t ever repeat themselves. Instant reaction and not prolonged contemplation is my modus operandi. Spontaneous visual “accidents” feed me automatically with ideas for new frames. The accumulation reshuffles themselves into logical bits and pieces of experience and weaves new untold stories.

My photography is about making common moments seeming uncommon.

Rabi Khan

In Search

Mixed Media Installation + Photo Montage, Single channel Video

With a metro population of over 12 million, Dhaka, the capital of Bangladesh is one of the most populous and dense in the world. Rapid growth here however, is still underway. Last year Dhaka observed its 400^th anniversary…here I grew up…lived most of my life, with love-learned to live, love and dream…my city of joy.

Manir Mrittik

I see the diversity of human life as part of nature. Thus I don’t often include man made social problems within my work. But sometimes I am helpless. 

 Hit and Miss

Life is a game without any pause. We start it but have to leave before the end. So, the result of the game remains unknown. But, had we known what the result might be, we must have changed our game plan. When I started working on Old Dhaka, began the feeling that we are playing a destructive game to rub out this historical place from the pages of history. Most of the architecture is getting shattered and people of Old Dhaka are also living in risk. 

Understanding these facts, I made an interactive game for this project. The concept of the game is based on the precious architecture of Old Dhaka. In this game audience will see a wall of the old town. They have to destroy the wall as well as the town if they want to play. By the end of the game my aim was to make players realize exactly what they are doing with the historical old town. And finally if they feel any urge to change

Tarun Ghosh

On the Banks of the Buriganga

 
Mahbubur Rahman

 A carnival of life faded away

 Installation
125, Shakhari Bazaar

Only in images today…. What priceless treasures this older part of Dhaka had in its trove in the yesteryears! How even today, the precious heritage and culture bow to the ruthless aggression of trade-intensive activities.

The ‘octopus’ of pollution is stifling down once the full-blooded, pristine river Buriganga. Here, once many splendored Shakhari Bazaar had a huge reputation for its matchless jewelry made of conch and shell.

Buriganga, once the lifeline of vibrant Dhaka of yesteryears is now creaking and groaning under the impact of development.

What was once a carnival of life fading away, it’s time and our turn to bring the carnival back to life.