Now screening: A dystopic world

An artwork titled Scatter Party

Pat yourself on the back if you're reading this article on the actual, physical newspaper because it means that, at least for some time, you have managed to wean yourself away from the sort of on-screen content consumption that has consumed our lives. We wake up in the morning and usually turn our phones on before even getting out of bed, transitioning thereafter to our laptops for work, Kindles for literature and the television for news and entertainment. In doing so, we gradually lose touch with who we really are, feels Sidhant Gandhi, aka Toosid, an artist who is exploring this theme in his first-ever solo exhibition, called Scatter Brain.

The installation of the smashed TV set at the exhibition

The Mumbaikar's works are currently on display at a city gallery, and Gandhi tells us, "Most of my art is meant to appall people, where I try to wake them up from the screen life we are living. Much of our actual interaction is with gadgets and not with people, and half of what we understand is based on our own perception. Also, when you eat food, you sh't it out. But when it comes to all the data that you are consuming, where is that going? It is sitting inside us and will burst open one day."

Sidhant Gandhi aka Toosid

That last thought informed an installation piece at the exhibition where he encouraged audience members to smash a dysfunctional TV set in order to liberate them from the age of excessive information, even if for a brief moment. There is another piece called Death by Hashtag that highlights how earlier, when a noteworthy person died, actual respect would be paid to their memory by, say, naming a road after them. "But now, they are reduced merely to a hashtag on social media because their relevance boils down to a screen," the 29-year-old says, emphasising how we are living in what he a calls a dystopian world where we transition from one gadget to the other, instead of spending meaningful time with less-complicated objects like the newspaper that you are hopefully holding in your hands.

Till: September 19, 8 am to 8 pm
At: Method Art Space, Bandra and Kala Ghoda outlets
Log on to: method.in