In the Panjab region of India, farming communities celebrate the harvest festival of Vaisakhi with an energetic form of music and dance called Bhangra. Looking to translate those moments of joy into a visual art form, the dancer Hardeep Sahota, who founded World Bhangra Day, enlisted help from the photographer Tim Smith to create a kind of “light painting.” Bhangra dancers were filmed while performing key moves; then, using exposure photography, Smith and Sahota traced their actions. Dance was transformed into calligraphic strokes of light, a beguiling and poetic series of images they dubbed “Bhangra Lexicon.” —E.C.
The Arts Intel Report
Hardeep Sahota: Bhangra Lexicon
Where
Available on the Yorkshire Sculpture Park Web site
Etc
Hardeep Sahota, “Bhangra Lexicon,” 2021. Photo: Tim Smith.