»We Found Our Own Reality« examines the cultural, political, and post-colonial echoes of South Asia’s avant-garde sonic pioneers, proposing an alternative reading of Modernist history that weaves together threads of the past with speculations of the future. At the core of the project is a large-scale exhibition at silent green Betonhalle, bringing together architecture, furniture, textiles, and sound to explore India's first electronic music studio, founded in 1969 at the National Institute of Design (NID) in Ahmedabad – as well as a new soundwork, developed by Paul Purgas from a collection of unheard recordings by five previously unknown Indian electronic composers.
Several supporting events will take place around the exhibition, including the »Zigzag Afterlives« film programme curated by Nancy Adajania, which engages with a set of epiphanic film experiments made by Indian artists, filmmakers, and composers during the 1960s and 1970s. A one-day discourse programme will reflect upon exchanges and resonances between the Indian and global experimental music and design communities both historically and into the present, featuring talks by Rahila Haque with Paul Purgas, Regina Bittner, You Nakai, Nabihah Iqbal, and Coven Code’s Lush Lata. The exhibition’s geometry will also set the scene for a series of live musical events during the exhibition period, with performances by Imran Perretta, Nabihah Iqbal, Paul Purgas, Poulomi Desai, and Suren Seneviratne.
