Untitled 

Editor: This untitled work is a drawing by Nasreen Mohamedi. It looks like graphite and charcoal on paper, almost like rows of a faded ledger. It feels both meticulously planned and yet delicate. What stands out to you? Curator: Immediately, I see a deep engagement with process. Consider the repetitive mark-making – the labor inherent in the creation. Mohamedi is using rudimentary materials, graphite and charcoal, and elevating them through the sheer force of disciplined, sustained action. The ‘abstraction’ becomes secondary to the evidence of her hand, wouldn't you agree? Editor: I do. It almost feels industrial in its repetition, but by hand. Is there a connection to the industrial labor movements in India when she was creating her work? Curator: Precisely! Think about the textile mills, the potteries, the workshops - all these sites of intense, repetitive labour. Mohamedi takes that repetitive labor from factory production into her drawing practice, mirroring those rhythms and potentially commenting on them. The "geometric" elements underscore how even the rigid geometry arises from this human action and production. It raises a point: who is the laborer and what product are they working on in this day of technological drawing? Editor: I see! So she's taking something very commonplace and turning it into fine art simply through the focused, laborious act of creation? Curator: In essence, yes. By drawing our attention to these elemental actions, she questions established divides separating craft and "high" art, labor and leisure, the functional and the purely aesthetic. What does that provoke in your thinking about artistic media today? Editor: I guess it pushes me to consider the value and intent behind artistic gestures. I am so caught up with 'innovation' in the materials of modern art; that simplicity, consistency and the labour involved are somehow radical. Curator: Exactly. Radical simplicity! Thanks for the interesting reflection. Editor: And thank you, it's certainly reframed my understanding of abstract drawings and labor.