Mapping Bones 2- performance and drawing

Mapping Bones 2 Performance and drawing work conceived and directed by Saranjit Birdi with Poet Phil Thomas and Sound Artist Tom Tebby. Performed at 1000 Trades Bar, Birmingham. 'In a time where nationalism, tribalism and cross-border conflicts seem to be the agenda, I turn inwardly to explore the terrain common to us all and non-negotiable, our skeleton'. Many years ago, I discovered an unusual ability to draw accurately with various parts of my body. I believe my abilities as a dancer and draftsman somehow merged. Weird at first, it became a compulsion, then a journey of discovery that gas led to giving art-science joint lectures at the University of Birmingham School of Bioscience and working in arts-in-health with people overcoming impaired movement. My critical interest is in relation to the evolution of the human body, its ‘totipotentiality’, and anthropological links with architecture and buildings. Process From my training as an architect and fascination with observational drawing, I challenge my body, discovering links between what is happening internally when I draw and what I sense through seeing. Creating what I call ‘Ambidextrous drawings’, I often have music playing, as some of the drawings can take several hours or days, and music takes me into a further dimension. I can relate my process to cartography, making maps of terrains by searching, researching, gathering information from several sources. Beyond this, I aim to create a beautiful drawing, ‘Mapping Bones’. Saranjit Birdi October 2018