At Dinacon: In fall 2023, while carrying out research for an exhibition informed by ideas of fermentation as treaty, Shalaka engaged with Astrida Neimanis and Rachel Loewen Walker’s proposition of “thick time”, wherein layers of time stack together, expand and contract. This model encourages a refusal of distinction between the human and non-human world, and instead, embraces an embodied understanding of ourselves as deep archives. Shalaka’s resonance with thick time shaped the exhibition and how their practice unfolds, and in particular, their research re: sound memory, radio methodologies, and considering how conductivity in and around waterbodies may shape answers to the question, “what if we get it right?”
Bio: Shalaka is a writer, researcher, and curator who spent their childhood between cities in India and in Dubai, before moving to a neighbourhood spitting distance from Ontario’s largest mall. Shalaka’s research interests on spatial positionality and critical geographies of grief, public memory, and queer ecologies can be evidenced in exhibitions they have curated in Halifax, Winnipeg, and Toronto. Shalaka has held roles at OCAD and The Blackwood, and is the co-director of Textile, a hyper-local arts collective in Waterloo Region that supports writers and artists through mentorship, publishing, and curation. Shalaka splits their time on Haldimand Tract and Treaty 1 territory and always orders dessert.