We draw lines in the sand to demarcate what we believe belongs to us. These lines have grown into barriers that divide us. Throughout history, these walls have become palimpsests of separation and segregation – a layering of the present over half remembered lives of the past.

Since time immemorial, erecting a wall is not so much a strategy for protection, as a symbol for the absence of one. However, the greater wisdom would have been to live without walls which have eventually divided us into classes, sects, tribes and separated us as humans. We have claimed and portioned land, that is not ours to possess, based on our perceptions of community, built on the shifting sands of politics, race, caste and culture. In these battles for possession, we have forgotten that the earth has been bled on in a singular shade of crimson. Our glorified notions of culture and civilization are born and built within walls that we have erected. The earth has a greater life and destiny; one that far surpasses our brief interlude here. There are people who believe that we are born to live a life that is one of a higher consciousness with a karmic and spiritual responsibility; rather than dictated by a desire to posses a patch of earth that we have inhabited for but a moment in time.

Today, the truth of human existence is that we stand sectioned, competing, prejudiced, divided and isolated as a race though we have more common amongst us, than not. These walls contain in them centuries of human experience; they have absorbed history and stood testament to our triumphs and tribulations.

‘Lines In The Sand’ is a natural progression of my work, the philosophical crux of questions that linger in my mind; of origin, roots and self discovery; with a leaning towards our history. The questions of traditionality versus modernism in the context of human existence and of evolution; with abstraction as my language of choice. These thoughts form the bedrock of my work and philosophy as an artist; yet, leaves room for interpretation and relative context.

Shibu Arakkal

Summer | Twenty Fifteen

Shibu ArakkalLines In The Sand – Artist’s Note