In Nepal every household has one or more family members working and living abroad. Those who become migrant workers help sustain the lives they leave behind. Unfortunately, many Nepali migrant workers are often subjected to exploitation, abuse, slavery, and even face untimely death.

 

Focusing on the theme of migration, artist Hit Man Gurung has come up with his solo exhibition ‘I have to feed myself, my family and my country…’ from August 16 at Siddhartha Art Gallery, Babermahal. The exhibition features paintings and installations that reflect hopes and aspirations of migrant workers as well as the misery of death often experienced by families of those workers who never return home.

 

In one of the installations using an actual coffin that arrived in Nepal with the dead body of a migrant worker, Gurung has exposed the harsh reality of life abroad. The inside of the coffin is covered with a collage of photographs of those who apply for visas every day, along with calligraphy about their origin and destination on the top and bottom of the photographs. The exterior of the coffin has tiny prints of passports of the same people. On the cover of the coffin, he has drawn the world’s map highlighting the areas with the highest concentration of Nepali migrant workers.

 

Being from a Gurung family — that has the tradition of joining foreign armies — the artist too had to go under the pressure of going abroad. And in contemporary time many Nepalis regardless of caste are leaving the country looking for foreign employment and better pay. This reality inspired Gurung to work on the theme of migrant workers.

 

In one of his paintings, he has painted a portrait of an elderly Gurung couple — the man is holding a cancelled passport of his only son who died while working in a gulf country. The portrait is painted in dark and light shades of grey while the woman’s hoop earrings are painted in golden colour. On the backdrop there is repetitive image of the couple’s house in brown and built from the money they got as compensation for their son’s life. Explaining about the painting, Gurung shared, “While doing my research on the condition of family whose loved ones never returned alive from foreign lands, I found about this couple who lives in a remote village of Lamjung. To depict their grief I used grey hues while I painted the earrings golden to focus the tradition in my community. The one going abroad takes one tola gold as loan, when he returns home he has to return two tola of gold to the same person.”

 

These artworks have been created from 2013 to 2015 where his works from the current exhibition will be exhibited in the 8th Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art, Australia. It’s the first time Nepal has been included in the event where Gurung will represent the country.

The exhibition is on till August 19.